Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last week announced “victory” in a vicious, anti-drug campaign, in which police were given a licence to use “extreme measures” to stamp out the selling of methamphetamines, known locally as “yaba” or “crazy medicine”. This three-month reign of police terror left at least 2,274 people dead. The government and police implausibly ascribed the deaths to gangland feuding, insisting that only 42 drug suspects were shot by police officers—most of those in “self-defence”. In fact, the government openly encouraged the police to carry out extra-judicial killings so that the arbitrary goals of its “war on drugs” could be met on time. The Narcotics Control Board provided the indices: 1,765 people arrested as major drug dealers and another 15,244 as minor dealers. More than 280,000 “drug pushers” and “addicts” gave themselves up to authorities and were sent for rehabilitation. In all, some 15.5 million pills were confiscated and the street price for the drug doubled or trebled over the course of the three months from February 1 to April 30. All 75 of Thailand’s provinces reported that they had more than fulfilled their quota of reducing the number of drug dealers by 50 percent. In some cases, officials boasted of a 100 percent “success rate”—that is, all drug dealers in their province either dead or detained. Interior Minister Wan Muhammad Nor Matha claimed that 440 local officials and politicians, including two police colonels, had been dismissed because of links to drug trafficking. The government used a system of bribes and threats to ensure that regional governors and police chiefs carried out the campaign. Three lists were compiled: one by police; the second by local administrative organisations and village heads; and the last by the Narcotics Control Board. Officials who failed to meet their quotas faced dismissal. Those who brought in a “major drug dealer”—dead or alive—received a bounty of one million baht ($US23,600). But just who has been arrested or gunned down is unclear, as the allegations against those on the blacklists have not been tested in a court of law. Those whose names appeared had no way of finding out the nature of the accusations against them. Terrified of being framed up or shot dead, thousands opted to hand themselves in and submit to a course of boot-camp style rehabilitation. Among those killed was a nine-year-old boy who was shot dead in late February. While undercover police were arresting his father, allegedly in a sting operation, his panic-stricken mother sped off in the family vehicle with the child on board. When police caught up with the car, the woman fled. Before opening the vehicle, the police fired into it at point-blank range killing the boy. ------------------ For further detail: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/may2003/thai-m09.shtml