DEALERS WILL HAVE TO RUN FOREVER, SAYS PM

Police Safety Comes First In Campaign

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has warned traffickers on the run from the
government's war on drugs to think twice about returning to Thailand.

Mr Thaksin said he was happy with the first three days of the campaign, with
prominent drug dealers having been arrested while many others were being
hunted down.

Any drug dealers who had fled Thailand would be arrested if they came back,
he said.

"They have to run for the rest of their lives and not come back because we
have details about all the important dealers." Mr Thaksin said the drug
clampdown would be evaluated constantly and improved after three months.

The public need not worry about extra-judicial killings since police would
do everything in accordance with the law.

"Do not put the safety of drug dealers above that of police.

"If police do not shoot when they fight, they will die. Do not care about
drug dealers or they will sell drugs to your children _ look out," the prime
minister said.

The Northern Narcotics Control Centre in Chiang Mai said 100 of 300
blacklisted drug gangs in the North had fled the country.

Pitthaya Jinawat, director of the centre, said each group included a network
of about 200 small-scale dealers who would be tackled by local police. He
and the Mae Hong Son governor would ask the military to crack down on
blacklisted drug dealers, most of whom were local leaders and politicians.

In Chiang Rai's Mae Sai district, a border source said major drug dealers,
including several village headmen, had gone into hiding in Burma.

Police spokesman Pol Maj-Gen Pongsaphat Pongcharoen said police yesterday
arrested 1,195 drug suspects, 16 of them major drug dealers, and seized
314,535 speed pills.

In the first three days of the crackdown, which started at the weekend,
police arrested 2,694 suspects, 80 of them major dealers, and seized 3.4
million methamphetamine pills.

Four suspects were killed in shootouts.