BANGKOK, Sept 16 – More than 800kg of illicit drugs, seized in over 130,000 cases, will be burnt at the Bang Pa-in industrial estate in Ayutthaya on Saturday, according to Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Secretary-General Dr Pipat Yingseri.
The authorities staging this 40th ceremonial incineration of illegal substances gathered drugs seized in relation to 133,221 police cases valued at Bt2.45 billion.
With a total weight of 821kg, over 75 per cent — some 634kg — were methamphetamines worth Bt2.1 billion. The rest included 124kg of heroin (Bt311 million), 4.6kg of marijuana (Bt23,000) and 41kg of opium (Bt1 million).
Prime Minister Yingluck Shinwatra will preside at the incineration on Saturday.
Dr Pipat said additional funds will be sought to enlarge the warehouse to store illegal substances pending the carrying out of the legal process.
The current storage capacity will be insufficient if the government crackdown on illicit drug is stepped up. He said it can take over five years to finish some cases in court.
The government recently launched a campaign against narcotics.
Deputy Prime Minister Chalerm Yoobamrung on Thursday promised that the campaign will follow the rule of law and that any operations by law-enforcing officials will not be against the law.
Mr Chalerm gave assurances in response to concern expressed by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Regional Centre for the East Asia and the Pacific which feared that the Yingluck government’s anti-drug campaign might lead to human rights violations or to extra-judicial killings by the police.
The UNODC reservations expressed referred to the war on drugs initiated between 2003-2004 by then prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, elder brother of current prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra, a campaign which led to the deaths of more than 2,500 people.
Mr Thaksin’s war against drugs drew heavy criticism from human rights groups at home and abroad.
