InterPress News Service (IPS); Sunday, 25 May 1997.
A.B. Mahapatra

A Burmese who came here as a young boy 40 years ago, Unn is a drug runner, helping smuggle narcotics from across the border into India. It is a risky job, involving hard physical work, but now things have become simpler.

"The Indian government has helped our business in a big way," Unn says with a faint smile. He is referring to the opening of trade along the 1,300 km India-Burma border two years ago. Tse Mung, another drug runner, says the open border has made things easier for others like him who had to cover difficult mountain terrain to get their supplies.

The border was opened in 1995 after prolonged talks between New Delhi and Rangoon to give a boost to the economy of India's backward northeastern region. But border officials, worried that the opening may have helped only the drug traffickers, say it might be closed again for some time. While Indian trade with Burma grew by a mere 0.3 percent last year, the cross border narcotics traffic has shot up five-fold since 1992.

Acetic anhydride, a chemical essential for making fine grade heroin, is being smuggled across from the Indian side to 42 heroin conversion laboratories in Burma, say narcotics officials.

Recently the Burmese Army confiscated 9,000 tonnes of the chemical on the way to Tamu from India. Indian authorities seized 43 kg of pure grade heroin and rounded up 1,100 people along the border in recent months.

"Since the very purpose is lost we may close the entire border for an indefinite period. But before that we have decided to hold another round of talks in early July," says a senior border oficial here.

Indian narcotics officials say that the open border trade with Burma has made the northeastern states a major transit point for drugs originating from Southeast Asia's infamous Golden Triangle.

The drug traffickers find it easy to recruit runners and peddlers from among the large number of jobless local young men, says Resiang Deorei Singh who works with a non-governmental organisation.

The easy availability of narcotics has given rise to drug addiction problems in the northeastern states, specially Manipur. The drug users who inject themselves with the narcotic, usually share the same syringe, the main reason for the alarming spread of the AIDS virus in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram and Manipur which have a common border with Burma.

In Manipur, each family is estimated to have at least two injectable drug addicts.

Indian narcotics officials tell how not long ago China closed its border with Burma which was opened for trading four years ago when it faced a similar problem of drug addiction and HIV spread in its Sichuan and Yunan province.

The officials in the Narcotics Control Bureau say it is not possible to police the entire border. There are no check points between the border towns of Morah, Bishoi and Champahi, a 270 km stretch along Burma's Shan province. These are the main main transit points for narcotics sent from Burma, Laos and Thailand, they say.

The border trade opening followed a sharp surge in opium cultivation in Burma, say officials. Within a decade, the area under the poppy crop in Burma increased nearly three-fold to 210,039 hectares in 1996.

Officials say that Burmese drug traffickers began using the Indian border in a big way after the crackdown on smuggling activities along the Burmese-Thai border.

A recent U.N. International Narcotics Control Bureau report says India is a major trans-shipment point for heroin from southwest and southeast Asia. It accuses the Burmese government of turning a blind eye to drug trafficking.

Though India and Burma have signed three major agreements to tackle the problem, these have had little effect. Locals in the border town of Tamu on the Burmese side allege that some Burmese Army personnel are involved in the drug trade.

"The army is at least very honest in paying off our dues," says Ruska Saw, a poppy cultivator who often crosses over to the Indian side for shelter when disputes arise with the Burmese Army. (END/IPS/abm/mu/97)

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IP970504

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