IN CONFIDENCE
Thai Trawler
44. On 8th December, 1974, a patrolling Islander aircraft of the Royal Hong Kong Auxiliary Air Force sighted what the pilot believed to be a Thai fishing trawler at anchor south of the Lima Islands, in an area known to have been used in the past for transhipping drug consignments to Hong Kong junks. The vessel was photographed, and further reconnaissance flights were made on 9th December, when N.B. officers accompanying the aircraft confirmed the identity of the vessel. Throughout 9th December the trawler took evasive action whenever the aircraft approached but visual contact was maintained until nightfall. A Royal Naval patrol vessel reached the area later in the evening but the trawler was not seen, and renewed aerial surveillance on 10th December confirmed that the trawler had left the area.
45. Subsequent information from reliable sources in Thailand indicates that the trawler returned to the Gulf of Thailand on or about 16th December, still carrying its cargo of almost 4 tons of raw opium. The sources also state that since this harassing operation there have been no further sailings of Thai trawlers for Hong Kong.
46. Thai trawlers have been used since 1966 to bring drugs to Hong Kong, taking a route from the Gulf of Thailand well to the South of Vietnam and meeting junks arranged by Hong Kong syndicates in International waters to the South of the Colony. They usually carry between one and two tons of raw opium and about 100 kilogrammes of crude morphine for conversion into heroin.
Over the past two years a number of combined operations have been mounted by the Narcotics Bureau together with the RHKAAF and the Royal Navy, but this was the first occasion on which a Thai trawler had actually been sighted and identified.
The Thai Trawler photographed by an officer of the R.H.K.A.A.F. on 8th December
1974.
18
IN
CONFIDENCE