YANGON (AFP) - Myanmar arrested 368 drug traffickers last month and seized more than three million illegal stimulant tablets, state media reported, in a bid to counter US claims that it has failed to tackle drugs.
The New Light of Myanmar newspaper said that in March police, customs officials and the military together recovered opium, heroin and low-grade opium.
They also seized stimulant tablets and chemicals used to make drugs, the newspaper reported.
"Action was taken against 368 persons -- 291 men and 77 women -- in 251 cases," the paper said.
Myanmar's junta has vowed that the country will be drug-free by 2014 but it remains the world's second-largest opium producer after Afghanistan.
The US says the nation has also become a hub for amphetamine production.
There has been a huge drop in opium cultivation in the country since the 1990s but poverty and the global financial crisis have seen many farmers return to the trade.
A UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) report in February noted a three percent increase in cultivated areas in 2008, when the crop was grown on 28,500 hectares (70,425 acres).
Myanmar's foreign ministry in March accused the US of giving "inaccurate and politically motivated assessments" in its global narcotics report in February, which said there had been a significant increase in opium poppy cultivation.
Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962 and is under broad US and European sanctions over its lack of democratic reform, widely documented human rights abuses, and the detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Source: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090411/world/myanmar_crime_drugs_arrest_1
The New Light of Myanmar newspaper said that in March police, customs officials and the military together recovered opium, heroin and low-grade opium.
They also seized stimulant tablets and chemicals used to make drugs, the newspaper reported.
"Action was taken against 368 persons -- 291 men and 77 women -- in 251 cases," the paper said.
Myanmar's junta has vowed that the country will be drug-free by 2014 but it remains the world's second-largest opium producer after Afghanistan.
The US says the nation has also become a hub for amphetamine production.
There has been a huge drop in opium cultivation in the country since the 1990s but poverty and the global financial crisis have seen many farmers return to the trade.
A UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) report in February noted a three percent increase in cultivated areas in 2008, when the crop was grown on 28,500 hectares (70,425 acres).
Myanmar's foreign ministry in March accused the US of giving "inaccurate and politically motivated assessments" in its global narcotics report in February, which said there had been a significant increase in opium poppy cultivation.
Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962 and is under broad US and European sanctions over its lack of democratic reform, widely documented human rights abuses, and the detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Source: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090411/world/myanmar_crime_drugs_arrest_1
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