Undercover police who dressed like construction workers arrested numerous suspected Nigerian drug dealers in the Nana area of Bangkok early Sunday morning.
Forty plainclothes officers – dressed mostly as a team of construction workers – arrested eight Nigerian men and a Thai suspect aged 23-41 in the Nana area of Bangkok just after 12am Sunday.
The operation on Sukhumvit 11 Road was a response to online complaints and warnings about African drug dealers and pickpockets annoying tourists in the Nana area.
Such drug dealers normally hold packets of cocaine and drugs in their mouths, police said. If there are customers, they spit out the packets and sell the drug. If police show up, they swallow the packets and run.
The officers quietly approached groups of suspected dealers and arrested them.
Police seized two packets of cocaine. They were waiting for other suspects to empty their bowels, expecting to seize more drugs.
Police said narcotics were smuggled into the country by drug dealers who swallowed packets of drugs and arrived by air. Once the drugs were retrieved from the smugglers' digestive systems, they were sold at tourist destinations.
