New Year Provokes Tighter Security In Mae Sai

[george]

New Year Festival Provokes Tighter Security in Mae Sai

MAE SAI: -- Thai authorities plan to step up surveillance in border regions, particularly around the Mae Sai checkpoint, during the coming New Year Festival.

Pittaya Chinawat, director of the Office of Narcotics Control Board Section 5, told The Irrawaddy today that his office will collaborate with the Thai military and immigration authorities in Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai provinces to increase surveillance in high-risk areas along the Thai-Burma border.

Mae Sai, a popular border crossing among tourists in Thailand and Burma, is considered a particularly high-risk area, and Thai authorities are concerned that drug traffickers will attempt to use tourists as carriers. Large crowds are expected to pass through the immigration checkpoint into Tachileik, Burma, during the holiday.

Pittaya warned that tourists may experience delays on the northern route to Mae Sai, as authorities have established additional police and military checkpoints.

“In addition, travelers should also be careful when they park their cars,” Pittaya added. “Drugs may be hidden in your vehicle.”

He further warned travelers not to accept any packages from strangers, particularly from the Burma border area. “We think this time the movement from big traffickers may decrease because they know that we will be watching.”

The increase in surveillance is part of a national drug clearance strategy—first initiated in 2003—which has been in effect since December 20 and will continue until late January 2006. Other features of the strategy include the use of drug-detecting dogs and an x-ray machine to screen cars for hidden caches of drugs.

Mae Sai immigration authorities will also be on the lookout for migrant workers trying to enter the country illegally and smugglers attempting to transport illegal goods into Thailand.

According to Pol Col Jetsada Yaisun, head of the Mae Sai Immigration Office, additional security cameras have been installed around the Mae Sai border checkpoint to track illegal activity such as human trafficking and to monitor Thai travelers who cross the border to gamble in Tachileik.

Mae Sai’s border checkpoint will be open from 6:30 pm to midnight on New Year’s Eve. Thai officials anticipate that some 10,000 people will cross the border each day during New Years celebrations.

--irrawaddy.org 2005-12-27

[sriracha john]

The increase in surveillance is part of a national drug clearance strategy—first initiated in 2003—

Ahhhh... ok... so that's what they're calling 2,500 unsolved murders these days?