TERROR GANGS LINKED TO DRUGS

In recent years, the number of governments aiding terrorists and
subversives has dwindled, and support by the few recalcitrant regimes
has become far more secretive. That has come largely because such
governments are internationally reviled, subject to high-profile
United Nations sanctions and shame. As the utter horror of terrorism
has become better known, no government and few groups can be seen to
lend their backing. Unfortunately, the terrorists and agents of
repression have not followed the road to respectability. Because even
terrorism and rebellion cost money, violent gangs have turned to
another source of funding. Around the world, drug and terrorist gangs
have formed links or joined up.

The evidence is clear enough. Governments and political parties who
used to openly brag disgracefully that "the object of terrorism is to
terrorise", now claim to be strongly opposed to such doctrine. Libya
and North Korea, each in their own way, have made deals to drop all
support for terrorist gangs, as have the Irish rebels and Japanese
gangs these regimes once openly supported. Chinese bookstores no
longer offer Communist Party manuals on terrorism; the last Asian
Maoist rebels in the Philippines loudly declare that no terrorism is
allowed, that its Manila terrorist wing has been dismantled.

But from Afghanistan to Thailand, from Colombia to Burma, there is
hardly any distinction any longer between drug gangs and rebels. The
Taliban began trafficking opium and heroin as a rogue state prior to
2001. Now the group has become one of the world's biggest drug gangs,
while continuing to battle to regain political control. In Colombia,
there are no more drug cartels. Police and public opinion saw off
colourful Pablo Escobar and his ilk without a tear. But the rebel
group known as Farc from its initials in Spanish has become, in
effect, South America's biggest drug cartel - financing its
opposition to the government with big-time drug contacts.

Much the same thing has happened in Burma, with dire danger for
Thailand and neighbouring Indian provinces. As Thai authorities and
the government rolled up the Burmese drug gangs of Lo Hsing-Han and
Khun Sa, for example, groups which had been political rebels stepped
in to soil their hands. After the Burmese government eliminated the
last of the big-time drug merchants, trafficking gangs in Burma not
only continued - they grew bigger.

A group of former political rebels known as the United Wa State Army
works mostly inside Burma to sell drugs mostly outside Burma. Once,
the UWSA were the chief fighting arm of the Burmese Communist Party,
with close ties to Chinese communists and known popularly as the Red
Wa, a name still heard today.

Today, the Burma-based political-drug gang has at least an informal
alliance with the Islamist gangs in southern Thailand. In the past,
separatist rings had support from outside, notably including Libya
and Iran. With that backing removed, the often shadowy gangs have
found other ways to finance both their violence and their
political-religious uprising - crime, and specifically drugs. Clearly
it is profitable.

Authorities late last year seized 30 million baht hidden under
floorboards in a Sungai Kolok district home in Narathiwat province.
The suspected drug dealer had known ties to the insurgents.

These days, when battling organised pro-terror groups like the
Taliban or Thailand's southern insurgents, security forces must also
consider drug ties. The fastest way to a gang's defeat is through
their funding.