Mammoth stash: A handout photograph by India’s Defence Ministry showing the seized drugs in Sri Vijaya Puram. — AFP
THE country’s coast guard said they had seized their biggest haul of illicit drugs when they stopped a fishing boat smuggling 5.5 tonnes of meth from Myanmar.
An Indian Coast Guard (ICG) reconnaissance air patrol spotted a small fishing boat in the Andaman Sea, which lies between India and Myanmar, “operating in a suspicious manner”.
A coast guard vessel was sent out, with officers boarding at dawn last Sunday when the fishing boat with a crew of six Myanmar citizens entered Indian territorial waters, the coastguard statement said yesterday.
“The boarding party found approximately 5,500kg of prohibited drug methamphetamine.
“The seizure is the biggest-ever drug haul by ICG, highlighting its commitment to safeguarding Indian territorial waters.”
The boat has since been taken to an Indian naval base.
Myanmar has been in turmoil since the military deposed Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in 2021 and launched a crackdown that sparked an armed uprising.
Myanmar’s Shan state is a leading source of synthetic drugs, much of it produced in illegal laboratories hidden in rugged jungle regions controlled by armed groups near Thailand’s border.
Drug producers have increasingly turned to smuggling by boats to avoid tighter patrols on land routes through China and Thailand.
A record 190 tonnes of methamphetamine were seized in East and South-East Asia in 2023, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).The seizure made by India could have been sold for millions of dollars on the street.
However, UN experts say mass manufacturing means the wholesale price of methamphetamine is as low as US$400 (RM1,781) per kilogramme in production areas. — AFP
