Myanmar buying Ecstasy

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Myanmar buying Ecstasy

Myanmar conflict leads to growing supply and falling prices for deadly stimulant. Residents of Sailulak, a quiet village in northeastern India that lies close to the border with Myanmar, found two things out of the ordinary in the summer of First, there were the unrelenting monsoon rains, earlier than usual. And then there were the four young strangers who began frequenting the area, carrying six large nylon bags. The young men claimed to be buying dried red chilies. When the suspicious villagers called the region's excise department, officers found -- neatly packed beneath the dehydrated red peppers -- 60 bundles of 10, methamphetamine tablets each. The men had spent hours ferrying the consignment across the rain-drenched muddy tracks from Dawn village in Myanmar to Sailulak in India. Special Reports From India to Australia, Myanmar is flooding Asia with cheap meth Myanmar conflict leads to growing supply and falling prices for deadly stimulant. March 29, JST. Read Next. International relations. Myanmar Crisis. Afghanistan turmoil. The Nikkei View. Latest on Special Reports. Special Reports. Sponsored Content.

‘Cheaper than beer’: Laos meth prices plummet as Myanmar chaos fuels trade

Myanmar buying Ecstasy

In June , the Cambodian government set up a media show, burning 1, drums of safrole-rich oil—a key ingredient in the manufacture of the illicit recreational drug ecstasy—with the help of the Australian Federal Police AFP. While thick black plumes of smoke went into the air, Australian police officers, who had traveled to Cambodia to assist in the public burning, looked on wearing chemical suits and breathing apparatus. Article by. Many people believe that ecstasy is merely a synthetic drug that is manufactured solely with chemicals, so-called precursors. However, the main raw material for ecstasy, safrole, is extracted from various plants and trees in the form of safrole-rich oils—also known as sassafras oil. These oils may contain safrole levels of more than 80 percent or 90 percent. They are usually first converted into chemical precursors before being diverted from the legal trade to clandestine ecstasy labs. Safrole and its derivatives have many legal uses as well. It is marketed worldwide in large quantities as raw materials for the fragrance and pesticide industries. The main production area is Southeast Asia and China. Burma is a significant producer of safrole-rich oils, locally known as thitkado. Thitkado is also locally used as a traditional medicine—applied externally against skin diseases and rashes and for inhaling. It became part of the international drug control agenda in with the adoption of the Convention against the Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances. To prevent the diversion of precursors and essential chemicals from licit channels to illicit drug manufacture through an import-export pre-notification system, the International Narcotics Control Board INCB has developed special guidelines. Safrole and safrole-rich oils are both scheduled on the Red list of the INCB and are subjected to controls. As the demand and supply of drugs still cannot be controlled, preventing the diversion of precursors to produce them has become one way to reduce the supply. However, precursor control suffers from the same setbacks as the fight against drugs in general: despite increasing control mechanisms, the market is not really affected. The public burning in Cambodia was staged with the help of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime UNODC , which has been sounding the alarm bell on the illicit trade in safrole-rich oils for some years already. The livelihoods of 12, to 15, people in the wildlife sanctuary are at risk. Cambodian authorities dismantled more than 50 clandestine laboratories and arrested 60 to people involved in safrole production in the past few years. The current production methods of safrole-rich oils endanger both the flora and fauna in fragile ecosystems and impact on the livelihood of the local population. To produce the oil, entire wild and often rare forest trees are felled and the oil is steam-distilled from the timber, the root and stump. The wood is chopped into small blocks and shredded. This is then distilled in large metal vats over wood fires for at least five days. The firewood needed to steam-distill the oil exacerbates the harm. According to TNI research in northern Burma, for every safrole-rich tree, ten other trees are needed to distil the oil. A survey in East and Southeast Asia by the UNODC in found plants that are rich in safrole, mostly of the cinnamon tree species, such as the camphor tree Cinnamomum camphora —a large evergreen tree up to meters tall common in Southeast Asia. In most species, safrole is in the root and the stumps. Nevertheless, some plant species make it possible to extract the oils from leaves and twigs and can thus be harvested in a sustainable manner. In China and Brazil, experiments with new, sustainable plants and trees are well advanced—in particular some Cinnamomum species and the Pimenta longa Piper hispidinervium , which has been introduced to Yunnan from Brazil, by the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden in China's Yunnan Province. Although the worry about the ecological damage is justifiable, questions remain about the effectiveness of public burnings. The approach might backfire by driving up the price and attracting more illegal harvesters. It is also questionable whether all the oil was destined for ecstasy laboratories since the bulk of the oil is still used for legal purposes. A wiser approach might be to sell the seized oil to the chemical industry and use the proceeds to set up sustainable production of safrole oil, providing livelihoods for the people involved. The aggregate annual production of safrole-rich oil in the region is estimated at 1, tons. China produces about tons, Burma tons, Cambodia tons, Laos 45 tons and Indonesia 35 tons. The Chinese chemical industry is the major end-user of the oils. Production in China has declined over the years, due to increased controls since Vietnam was a major producer of safrole rich oil until , when it was prohibited because of damage to the environment. However, Vietnam continues to import it for re-export to third countries. All countries in the region have regulations to control the harvesting and production of safrole-rich oils, including export and import. In Cambodia, Laos and Burma, these measures apply to all non-timber forest products; only China and Vietnam have specific legislation. The increased control in China and Vietnam, the two major trading countries, seems to have shifted production to countries were controls are less strict and law enforcement capacity is low, such as Burma, Laos and Cambodia. Permits were issued by the Burmese authorities to companies to harvest wood for oil production at the Tamanthi Hydropower Project in the Chindwin River in Sagaing Division near the border with India, where a dam would eventually cause submersion of large tracks of land the area. Five companies were licensed and each operated about 50 small stills to produce tonnes of thitkado oil for export to China. Illegal production of the oils and export to China also occurred; tons were seized during along smuggling routes from Sagaing Division to Yunnan. TNI research in found that thitkado oil is produced and traded in Kachin State. According to a Burmese government official, safrole-rich oils are produced in the country, but production is declining. He mentioned that trees in Kachin State were depleted. Since , the main production area was the Nhkai Bum Mountains, but this area is nearly completely deforested. The oil is bought by Chinese traders. According to a Kachin businessman, the Chinese market for thitkado oil is in Mangshi and Zhangkhong, a small border town north of Ruili and opposite of Mai Ja Yang. Most oil comes through Laiza, a border town controlled by the Kachin Independence Organisation KIO , and some comes from Nawng Tau, a border town near Ruili where illegal timber logging moves across the border. The KIO prohibited thitkado production in the areas under its control in The wood had become scarce and producers had to go deep into the forest to find the remaining trees. Nevertheless, the KIO still gave permission to harvest trees occasionally. Prices are increasing, say several sources. Until , one litre could be sold for 60 yuan, but due to the increased shortage of trees, the price increased to 90 yuan in , according to a trader in Ruili. Most people involved in the harvesting of trees are unaware of its commercial use. Some erroneously suspected that it was used for yama, or methamphetamine. One thought it was used to make an atomic bomb, indicating the level of secrecy surrounding the trade. The main tree used nowadays, according to TNI researchers, is the Laukya Mwe, the Burmese name for the Schima wallichii or the Chinese guger tree or needle wood. Before it used to be the Payok pin, the Burmese name for the Cinnamomum camphora or Camphor tree. Only the bark is used and sold in China. According to research in China, the bark of the Sassafras Tzumu has very high safrole content 97 percent. As noted, Safrole-rich oils are not only produced for the manufacturing of ecstasy, but are the raw materials for many legal products. Current safrole production is not meeting the market demand and the destructive extraction process raises serious concerns about the long-term availability of safrole. Preventing ecological damage and unsustainable harvesting of safrole-rich oils is urgently needed to preserve fragile ecosystems. However, burning illicitly produced oils will not contribute to a long-term solution, and might even be counterproductive. Lessons learned from alternative development programs to counter the illicit cultivation of opium in the region have to be taken into account to design an effective policy. Eradication of unsustainable safrole-rich oil production only makes sense when viable and sustainable alternatives are in place. A more effective approach would be to involve all stakeholders: The people now implicated in the harvesting, who need to be educated on sustainable harvesting and distilling methods; the chemical industry, which needs to produce raw materials in a responsible, environmentally friendly way; academic institutes involved in developing alternative plants and harvesting methods; and development organizations to fund and design alternative development programs for environmentally friendly and sustainable production of safrole-rich oil. Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter. Publication date: 3 February Authors Article by. Ineffective Approach The public burning in Cambodia was staged with the help of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime UNODC , which has been sounding the alarm bell on the illicit trade in safrole-rich oils for some years already. A Better Way Forward As noted, Safrole-rich oils are not only produced for the manufacturing of ecstasy, but are the raw materials for many legal products. Article: Newsletter banner Do you want to stay informed? Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Subscribe now. Hundreds of social struggles. Countless ideas turned into movement. Support us as we celebrate our 50th anniversary in Make a donation.

Myanmar buying Ecstasy