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Pandemic fails to curb South-east Asia's drug trade

The coronavirus pandemic has shut borders and slowed trade, yet South-east Asia's billion-dollar drug cartels are thriving. The Straits Times looks at why business for methamphetamine is booming and efforts to halt the scourge.

Malaysia's national police chief Abdul Hamid Bador (centre) last month showing the media a haul of methamphetamine seized in a raid. The police succeeded in crippling a Thai drug smuggling syndicate. Last May, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime said law enforcement in South-east Asia seized a record 115 tonnes of methamphetamine in 2019 - significantly more than the amount seized just two years previously.

PHOTO: BERNAMA

Jeffrey Hutton‍ Regional Correspondent In Jakarta, Jeffrey Hutton

Porous borders, poverty and nimble supply chains drive deluge of drugs

In a series of raids, as the Covid-19 pandemic was closing in last year, Myanmar security forces in northern Shan state netted 18 tonnes of methamphetamine - a record for Asia.

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Drug offences

Central Narcotics Bureau

Covid-19