CHIANG RAI/KHON KAEN: Two drug couriers have been arrested and 5 million methamphetamine pills seized in Chiang Rai province, and 550 kilogrammes of marijuana were found on an abandoned pickup truck that had crashed in Khon Kaen.
In northern Chiang Rai province, soldiers spotted a pickup truck they were looking for travelling on a secondary road between Chiang Rai-Chiang Mai around 9.30pm on Wednesday. They followed behind and came across it parked at the entry to a village in tambon Padaed of Mae Suai district.
Two men were seen to get out of the vehicle and load several cardboard boxes hidden in roadside bushes onto the back of the pickup. The soldiers moved in and seized a total of 13 cardboard boxes, found to contain 5 million speed pills in total.
The two men -- driver Jetsada Promso, 42, and Phet Pornathee, both from Chiang Rai -- were arrested.
The seizure followed an investigation by narcotics prevention and suppression officers, who learned a drug gang planned to smuggle a shipment of methamphetamine into the country through Mae Suai border district. (continues below)
In northeastern Khon Kaen province, police called to a road accident in Ban Phai district found black plastic bags containing 550 kilogramme-slabs of compressed marijuana in bags scattered on the roadside near an abandoned, crashed pickup truck early on Thursday morning.
The pickup had overturned about 5am at a curve on the Ban Phai-Nong Song Hong route in Ban Phai district, according to Pol Col Chamras Chandaeng, chief of Ban Phai police station.
Investigators believed the driver of the pickup truck was delivering the marijuana to a drug network member in Khon Kaen, with another vehicle scouting out the road ahead.
The pickup failed to take a curve and plunged into a roadside ditch. The driver fled.
Pol Col Chamras said a mobile phone, a wallet and four fake licence plates were found inside the vehicle.
The drugs were smuggled from a neighbouring country through Loei province and were destined for dealers in the Central Plains and the South, the Ban Phai police chief said.
