Over 830 tonnes of drug precursor seized in northern Thailand

The Office of the Narcotics Control Board (ONCB) officers seized more than 830 tonnes of drug precursors at a warehouse in the Mae Sot district, in the northern province of Tak, owned by Chinese nationals.

Officers from the ONCB, the Department of Special Investigation (DSI), local police, and administrative authorities raided a warehouse on Mae Sot Road in the Mae Kasa sub-district, Mae Sot district, Tak, yesterday, October 16. They discovered 4,418 tanks on the premises.

Among the tanks, 360 were filled with 830 tonnes of various chemical substances, each tank holding approximately 200 litres. The substances, which included sodium hydroxide, salicylic acid, methylamine, toluene, benzene, hydrobromic acid, acetone, propionophenone, and ethyl acetate, are drug precursors.

Officers suspect that the substances were intended for the production of crystal methamphetamine and ketamine at a factory in a neighbouring country. If the drug gang succeeded in transporting these chemical ingredients across the border, they would generate hundreds of billions of baht.

The officers also found multiple CCTV cameras both inside and outside the warehouse, leading them to believe that the warehouse owner monitored the site remotely. It is suspected that the property was owned by Chinese nationals who hired nominees to lease the warehouse.

The Thai national mentioned in the report is a 38 year old man named Pongphat, who resides in the central province of Samut Prakan. Pongphat previously informed officials that he rented the warehouse to store fruit, but only drug precursors were found there. He will be summoned for questioning.

According to ONCB officials, this raid followed a tip-off from officials abroad. These officials discovered that drug traffickers were gradually transporting drug precursors from Myanmar into Thailand and storing them at the warehouse.

Officials had been monitoring the situation since August of this year until the illegal activity became apparent. They added that this seizure is just the beginning of their operation, and they anticipate further confiscations of similar substances in the future.