[Myanmar] Shan State Police Profiting From Drug Trade: Rights Group

An ethnic non-governmental group, the Shan Human Rights Foundation, alleges in a report that police and military authorities in parts of Shan State are profiting from drug-trafficking issues, according to SHAN News. A monthly report on events in February claims that in the Burmese border town of Tachilek police are arbitrarily detaining youngsters and alleged drug users in order to shake them down for bribes. “The police arrest drug users only if they think they could get some money,†it said, adding that rights abuses are carried out in the process. Shan State has been plagued by opium and methamphetamine production for decades.