US PLEDGES SUPPORT FOR THAILAND'S HUNT FOR DRUG BARON

The United States will help Thailand crack down on drugs by sending
investigators and information on traffickers such as Myanmar kingpin
Wei Xiew-kang, officials said Thursday.

Police colonel Pirapan Premputi of the Anti-Money Laundering
Commission said after a meeting with US Drug Enforcement Agency
officials that the United States would also send a blacklist of
regional drug traders.

"It includes a few Thais who are on the US blacklist for being
involved with drugs," he told reporters, adding that up to six ethnic
Chinese were believed to be working with Wei from Thailand.

Thai authorities last week seized property reportedly worth more than
two million dollars from Wei, an on-the-run Myanmar drug baron who is
wanted by the United States.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said last Friday that Wei, who is
thought to be hiding in Myanmar, would be caught dead or alive.

Wei, who leads the United Wa State Army, jumped bail in Thailand in
1990. He is considered a major producer of the amphetamines that are
now flooding Thailand and also being sent to Western nations.

A Thai court sentenced him to life in jail in absentia in 1994 for
helping to smuggle 615 kilogrammes (1,356 pounds) of heroin out of
Thailand. He also faces drug trafficking charges in the United States.

Wei was born in China and given Thai nationality, which was cancelled
in the 1980s.