The downfall of millionaire “Mr X,” long shielded by cash and contacts in Laos, has highlighted the role of the secretive communist country in showering pills across Southeast Asia.
Allegedly a key figure among gangs buying drugs from Myanmar’s methamphetamine labs, Laotian Xaysana Keophimpha — dubbed “Mr X” — is believed to have used his graft-riddled country to shuttle narcotics south.
The heavy-set 42-year-old was on Jan. 19 arrested by Thai police at Bangkok’s main airport en route to Laos where he lived freely, reveling in a lifestyle of celebrity parties and supercars.
He denies charges of drug possession and smuggling.
However, subsequent police operations have turned up several more men accused of running drugs through Laos, an opaque country whose role in the regional narcotics trade is gradually emerging.
They are the suspected intermediaries of the “Golden Triangle,” shifting pills, methamphetamine and heroin from the world’s second-largest drug producing zone to a regional market.
Among the accused is Xaysana’s friend Sisouk Daoheoung — a minor Laotian celebrity with a penchant for thoroughbred horses, and a shared devotion to fast cars and fancy holidays flaunted on social media.
If police are right, their ostentation in one of Asia’s poorest countries was funded by smuggling highly addictive caffeine-laced methamphetamine pills — better known as “yaba,” or crazy medicine — and crystal meth.
“From Xaysana’s phone and Facebook records it was clear he and Sisouk are friends ... their [drug] groups are connected,” Thai Police Major-General Supakit Srijantranon told reporters last week.
At US$8 a pop in Thailand, the best yaba pills rise in price the further they move from source, bringing extraordinary rewards to the traffickers.
The highest-quality pills — with 15 to 20 percent meth purity — come from the factories of the North and South Wa — where armed ethnic groups have marshalled a self-governing state on the Myanmar-China border — and by the Lahu community.
Poor, corrupt and bordering five countries, Laos makes for an ideal transit route to the rest of Southeast Asia.
Drugs are moved across the Mekong River into Thailand then onto Malaysia and beyond.
Thailand is being hit hard by the trade.
Between October last year and last month, the country seized 74 million pills, according to the Thai Narcotics Control Board, as well as 2 tonnes of crystal meth and 320kg of heroin.
Police are fighting back and say they have battered three major Laos-linked drug networks, confiscating tens of millions of dollars’ worth of assets including hotels, cars, cash and a horse-riding school in Vientiane.
They are hunting a fourth group led by Usman Salameang, a Thai believed to be holed up in Laos, wanted for moving gear through Thailand’s violent border area into Malaysia.
Historically, Laos has been reluctant to admit it has a drug problem.
However, under Laotian Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith the country is keen to show that it is flushing out criminals and corrupt officials.
The recent arrests are part of Sisoulith’s get-tough message to the drug gangs.
China’s military news agency yesterday warned that Japanese militarism is infiltrating society through series such as Pokemon and Detective Conan, after recent controversies involving events at sensitive sites. In recent days, anime conventions throughout China have reportedly banned participants from dressing as characters from Pokemon or Detective Conan and prohibited sales of related products. China Military Online yesterday posted an article titled “Their schemes — beware the infiltration of Japanese militarism in culture and sports.” The article referenced recent controversies around the popular anime series Pokemon, Detective Conan and My Hero Academia, saying that “the evil influence of Japanese militarism lives on in
ANTI-SEMITISM: Some newsletters promote hateful ideas such as white supremacy and Holocaust denial, with one describing Adolf Hitler as ‘one of the greatest men of all time’ The global publishing platform Substack is generating revenue from newsletters that promote virulent Nazi ideology, white supremacy and anti-Semitism, a Guardian investigation has found. The platform, which says it has about 50 million users worldwide, allows members of the public to self-publish articles and charge for premium content. Substack takes about 10 percent of the revenue the newsletters make. About 5 million people pay for access to newsletters on its platform. Among them are newsletters that openly promote racist ideology. One, called NatSocToday, which has 2,800 subscribers, charges US$80 for an annual subscription, although most of its posts are available
GLORY FACADE: Residents are fighting the church’s plan to build a large flight of steps and a square that would entail destroying up to two blocks of homes Barcelona’s eternally unfinished Basilica de la Sagrada Familia has grown to become the world’s tallest church, but a conflict with residents threatens to delay the finish date for the monument designed more than 140 years ago. Swathed in scaffolding on a platform 54m above the ground, an enormous stone slab is being prepared to complete the cross of the central Jesus Christ tower. A huge yellow crane is to bring it up to the summit, which will stand at 172.5m and has snatched the record as the world’s tallest church from Germany’s Ulm Minster. The basilica’s peak will deliberately fall short of the
Venezuelan Nobel peace laureate Maria Corina Machado yesterday said that armed men “kidnapped” a close ally shortly after his release by authorities, following former Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro’s capture. The country’s Public Prosecutor’s Office confirmed later yesterday that former National Assembly vice president Juan Pablo Guanipa, 61, was again taken into custody and was to be put under house arrest, arguing that he violated the conditions of his release. Guanipa would be placed under house arrest “in order to safeguard the criminal process,” the office said in a statement. The conditions of Guanipa’s release have yet to be made public. Machado claimed that
RSS