Lao drug mules caught with meth, heroin near borders

By Son Nguyen   July 3, 2019 | 10:07 pm PT
Lao drug mules caught with meth, heroin near borders
Two Lao men are arrested with a bag of meth in Kon Tum Province, Vietnam, July 3, 2019. Photo by VnExpress/Son Nguyen.
Five Laotians were caught red-handed while bringing drugs into Vietnam on Wednesday.

Two men Duong Kon Tum, 23, and Thao Mip, 22, were caught bringing two kilograms of methamphetamine into the Central Highlands province of Kon Tum. They had the drugs wrapped in a plastic bag on their motorbike.

After crossing the Vietnam-Lao-Cambodia border, they had traveled some 500 meters when they were stopped by soldiers and local police.

On the same day, border guards in the northern Son La Province at the Laos border also arrested two women and a man from Laos for smuggling more than 2.5 kilograms of heroin and 30,000 ecstasy pills.

They are all in custody pending investigation.

Vietnam has become a key trafficking hub for narcotics from the Golden Triangle, an intersection of Laos, Thailand and Myanmar, the world's second largest drug producing area after the Golden Crescent in South Asia.

In Vietnam, those convicted of possessing or smuggling more than 600 grams of heroin or cocaine or more than 2.5 kg of methamphetamine can receive the death penalty. The production or sale of 100 grams of heroin or 300 grams of other illegal narcotics is also punishable by death.

 
 
go to top