Six foreign drug smugglers arrested

BANGKOK, April 11 (TNA) - Six foreigners, suspected of smuggling drugs from China to be sold in Thailand, have been apprehended. Police General Pongsapat Pongcharoen, Secretary-General of the Office of the Narcotics Control Board (ONCB), announced the arrest at a press conference held in Bangkok on Friday. Police General Pongsapat said that the six foreigners, including three Indonesians and one each from the Philippines, Nigeria and Niger, were arrested after Thai police found 3.5 kilogrammes of crystal methamphetamine, also known as "ice", allegedly in their possession. According to the ONCB chief, the Thai anti-narcotics police first arrested the Indonesians on April 8 while they were picking up a package sent from China, as the police found 530 grammes of "ice" hidden inside a glass vase. The rest of the suspects were arrested later at a hotel on Ramkhamhaeng Road in Bangkok, after Thai police found three kilogrammes of crystal methamphetamine hidden inside a bag and 49 of pressed powder inside condoms. The ONCB chief acknowledged that the suspects confessed during police's interrogations that they planned to sell the seized drugs in entertainment areas in Bangkok. ONCB officers also seized a list containing 12 names of Thai and foreigners, most of them women, in which they believed were sent to Thailand to practice in swallowing the powder before travelling to China's Guangzhou City to then smuggle drugs to Thailand. ONCB officers are, meanwhile, contacting the suspects' counterparts in Guangzhou, Indonesia, the Philippines, Nigeria and Niger in a bid to find whether there are more suspects involved in the smuggling ring.(TNA)