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Spike in heroin smugglers from region nabbed here
Teh Joo Lin Thu, Feb 07, 2008 The Straits Times
THE number of heroin smugglers from neighbouring countries busted here shot up by eight times in the past year, in a sign that syndicates are looking to fan demand for the drug here. Their attempts to push the drug here is happening just as Thailand and Myanmar are seeing bumper harvests of opium poppy, from which heroin is derived. Just three heroin traffickers from neighbouring states were caught here in 2006, but the number leapt to 23 last year. These traffickers contributed to an overall spike in the number of drug smugglers from the region caught in that time - from 42 in 2006 to 92 last year.

And on average, each trafficker brought in a larger stash, noted the Central Narcotics Bureau (CNB).

Seizures by the CNB stopped about 17.2kg of heroin from reaching the streets last year, nearly three times the amount seized the year before.

Traffickers have not let up their efforts a month and a half into the new year: On Monday, the CNB seized 10kg of heroin worth $1.5 million, its largest haul in five years.

The CNB said 'external syndicates' - flush with supplies from the region's bumper poppy crop - have been trying to break into the market here 'in the hope of attracting susceptible buyers'.

Crop monitors working for the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC) confirm that, after years of decline, yields from Myanmar's poppy fields had the potential to produce 46 per cent more dried opium last year.

This came partly from about 30 per cent more land put to poppy cultivation last year, bringing the total area for the crop to nearly 28,000ha, the size of about 40,000 football fields.

Thailand, a much smaller player, gave 31 per cent more land to poppy cultivation last year, compared to the year before. This will bump up its potential for opium production by a quarter.

Mr Jeremy Douglas, who until recently was a regional coordinator for UNODC in Bangkok, said Thai and Myanmar farmers have increased their crop yields by using new agricultural techniques to squeeze larger harvests from fields of a given size.

CNB deputy director S. Vijakumar, noting syndicates' efforts to 'offload their production capacity', said: 'It will be wishful thinking to imagine Singapore would not be one of the countries they will try to export to.'

The number of heroin abusers shot up by six times last year, following an all-time low in 2005.

But Mr Akira Fujino, an UNODC representative in Bangkok, said it is still too early to say that last year's bumper poppy crop signals the beginning of a golden period for the Golden Triangle, which has long been in decline.

He added that opium does not become heroin by magic, and that 'critical chemicals' were needed to make heroin.

Therefore, the movement of these chemicals in the region have to be tracked before linking any swell in heroin supply to the higher opium yields.

Meanwhile, the CNB is aiming to cripple overseas syndicates by working with their regional counterparts, including those from Malaysia, from where most drugs here come.

CNB's Mr Vijakumar said that because Singapore could not 'completely avert' the region's drug scourge, the CNB's intelligence network, enforcement operations and detection capabilities have to be stepped up.

joolin@sph.com.sg