Speed pills to invade Thailand

Speed pills to invade Thailand

THAILAND: Thailand's army is braced for a record influx of up to one billion "speed" pills to be trafficked across the Myanmar border next year, defense ministry sources said on Sunday.

Despite a "war on drugs" launched last year to curb an alarming addiction crisis in the kingdom, the flow of drugs is tipped to rise substantially from 700 million pills believed to have been trafficked in 2002.

"Each of the one billion pills is worth 100 baht, so the intake will be worth 100 billion baht (US$2.3 billion) -- that's a big number," a defense ministry official said.

The Third Army, which patrols the northern border with Myanmar where vast amounts of drugs including speed and heroin are manufactured by ethnic armies, reportedly said it planned to step up its offensive against the traffickers. -- AFP