Myanmar Times-19 Jan 2018
Myanmar anti-narcotic agents seized 30 million methamphetamine pills and 1.75 tons of pure methamphetamine, commonly known as “ice”, in the conflict area of Shan State, the Ministry of Home Affairs said Thursday, in what an agent described as the largest single drug bust in recent history.
Anti-narcotics agents also seized 462.4 kilograms of heroin blocks and 36.6kg of heroin bricks during a raid on Wednesday at a house in Lwe Khan village of Kutkai township, the statement said.
The total value of the seized drugs was estimated at US$54 million (K72.74 billion), it added.
The anti-narcotics operation at the house in Lwe Khan village was launched following the impounding of a vehicle and seizure of 12.52kg of heroin bricks a day earlier at the Oriental Toll Gate in Theinni township in Shan State.
Police arrested four people inside the vehicle, who led them to the bigger drug haul in Lwe Khan village of Kutkai township.
“This is a record capture in Myanmar,” a senior police officer said. “It was carried out by anti-narcotics team No. 42 at Theinni Oriental Tollgate. We arrested four people but the shipment’s owner is still at large.” one senior police officer of the anti-narcotics task force said.
Police have raised the alarm over the steady rise in seizures of synthetic drugs such as methamphetamine tablets and “ice” in the country even as they noted a decline in the areas of cultivation of opium poppies.
In 2016, police seized a record 98 million methamphetamine tablets, nearly double the 50 million tablets seized the year before.
In its latest report, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) noted a dramatic drop in opium cultivation in Myanmar, but expressed alarm over the boom in international demand for synthetic drugs.
It noted that between 2015 and 2017, opium poppy cultivation in the country dropped by a quarter.
The UNODC estimated that Myanmar’s Shan and Kachin states cultivated 41,000 hectares of opium poppy in 2017, a 25 percent drop from the 54,500 hectares reported in its last survey in 2015.
Myanmar is the source of most of Southeast Asia’s methamphetamine, which is mostly produced in lawless border regions outside the government’s control.
According to the UNODC, opium cultivation in Myanmar declined in 2017 despite the slowdown in the government’s efforts to eradicate opium poppy plantations.
It said Myanmar destroyed 3533 hectares of opium poppies in 2017, down from 13,450 hectares in 2015.
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