At least five drug traffickers were killed in a shootout with the Thai Army. During a special operation on the border connecting Thailand with Burma, specifically in Chiang Ra province.
Early on Wednesday, January 12, Suparerk Sathaphonphol, commander of the Pha Muang special forces, set up a surveillance patrol along the border between Thailand and Burma to prevent drug trafficking into the national territory, ‘Naewna’ informed. .
Later, one hundred officers, walking through a forest on the joint border of the two countries, saw a group of seven to eight men carrying luggage from neighboring countries. Searching for the men, they used firearms to fight off the soldiers, at which point a five-minute skirmish ensued from both sides.
Although no member of the Thai Armed Forces was injured, there were five dead on the opposite side. each carried 100,000 methamphetamine tablets, bringing the total number of tablets seized by the army to 500,000. According to the newspaper in question, the whereabouts of the rest of the people is unknown.
A similar incident occurred in December, killing 15 traffickers, while the Thai Army managed to kill six more drug traffickers last Sunday.
Methamphetamine smuggling skyrocketed in Thailand Since the military coup in the neighboring country in February 2021. Preliminary data from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).