SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST.
SEPT 15th '73-
Law heads
team to stop drug flow to world
RELAYED IN KAGISTRY NO.51
OCT 1973
1- kk 19/3
A multi-national organisation to stem the flow of narcotics from the "Golden Triangle" to the world will be headed by a Hongkong assistant commissioner of police, Mr Peter
Law.
Mr Law, former chief of the Anti-Corruption branch of the Royal Hongkong Police Force, will set up a new international office in Bangkok which is intended to be the most effective striking force yet conceived, to fight the opium emperors of Asia.
His new job poses a difficult predicament for both narcotics agents in Hongkong and for the police force and Army in Thailand.
First and foremost, Peter Law is charged with stopping the illegal exportation of drugs from the notorius Golden Triangle area where Burma, Laos and Thailand meet in the remote Northern highlands.
For manpower, he will have to co opt Thai policemen who will basically be responsible for carrying out his work.
A major complication is the number of anti-narcotics detectives in Thailand who are "on the take" from the Chiu Chow gangsters of the Yee On Shing who control the narcotics trade between Thailand and Hongkong.
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MR LAW
The organisation, of which Mr Law will be one of the chiefs, is the first and one of the most welcome organisa- tions to emerge from a series of secret conferences narcotics in the Far East.
оп
Many of these secret conferences have taken place in Hongkong.
They include meetings here between British. America, Hongkong and Thai drug fighters who have consistently named Hongkong as an international entreport of the international drug trade.
One of the secret meetings was disclosed by the S.C.M. Post in an exclusive story.
It was A high-powered meeting held in Hongkong last June during which the Hongkong Government was reported to have been criticised for the way it was tackling the drug bandits.
Although the experts were tight-lipped on what was going on at the meeting, the SCMP learned that allegations of corruption among Hongkong Government officials had been made.
American sources also said they were "not happy" with the way in which Hongkong was handling the problem.
Officially Mr Law will be going to Bangkok as a third secretary of the British Embassy to the court of the Thai King.
But unofficially, it was known last night that the former chief of Hongkong's anti-graft force was being sent to Bangkok as the "anchor man" of an international organisation which has been specially set up to combat the flow of drugs down the muddy surface of the Chiangmai River.
⚫ Officers of the Preventive Service in an ambush made in Shaukiwan last night, arrested an elderly woman and seized a large quantity of dangerous drugs worth more than $70,000 on the retail market.
The officers all wearing plainclothes, intercepted a taxi outside the Shaukiwan market and the passenger, a 60-year-old woman, was found with two large parcels.
On opening the parcels, the Preventive Service officers found them to contain 8 lbs of heroin and 2 lbs of barbitone.
Yesterday's seizure was the second drug haul made by the Preventive Service in the past week. Last Friday, they seized $300,000 worth of dangerous drugs from a flat in Western District.
The flat was believed to be the distribution centre for drug divans in the Western District.
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