Dear Friends and Colleagues,

This is an email from Black Poppy Magazine.

We would like to draw your attention to a protest that is being held at the Thai Embassy, this Thursday, the 12th of June 2003.

This will be an 'International Day of Action' to protest against the recent atrocities that have been occurring in Thailand against Thai drug users. Since the announcement by the Thai Prime Minister on Feb 1st that Thailand is to become a drug free country, some 2000 Thai drug users have been murdered by death squads and other extra-judicial killings.

The Thai Prime Minister, Mr Thaskin, has embarked on a crusade to clear his country of drugs and drug users by the end of Dec 03. His majority in Parliament allows him to act at will - if he is not confronted now by the international community more drug users, their families, their communities, will continue to endure murders, bloodshed, illegal imprisonments, & disappearances. PLEASE ACT ON JUNE 12TH - COME & PROTEST & Help draw attention to this insanity.

DETAILS:
The Thai Embassy, 29-30 Queens Gate, London SW7 5JB - 12th JUNE 2003 @ 2pm.

WAR ON DRUG Users

Notes from Bangkok Times
December 2, 2003 is the day the government will declare victory in the war on drugs to mark His Majesty the King's birthday on Dec 5. The government initially planned to declare victory on Aug 12, Her Majesty the Queen's birthday. However, since Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra wanted the drug war to be concluded by year's end, the date was changed to Dec 2.

Interior Minister Wan Muhamad Nor Matha said the task force set up to fight drugs will announce its first round of victory in August when up to 25 provinces are expected to be declared drugs-free. The drugs-free provinces must be 100% free of pushers, addicts and drug-running state officials, and provide rehabilitation for addicts. Mr Wan Nor said people in each community are responsible for making sure their community remains free of drugs after the crusade which officially ends at the end of this month.

Police `arrested, killed rehabilitated addicts' may 23rd Wassana Nanuam
Army chief Gen Somdhat Attanand has warned police and anti-drug authorities not to intimidate former drug addicts who have completed rehabilitation courses, after hundreds of complaints were lodged by village officials and local leaders in the North.
Most of the community leaders, from Tak, Mae Hong Son, Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai provinces, expressed fears for the safety of villagers whose names remained on a drugs blacklist, even though they were no longer dealing in methamphetamine, Gen Somdhat said.Several blacklisted suspects had allegedly been arrested or killed after reporting to authorities, he said.One local leader from Tak's Phop Phra district who requested anonymity said many former drug dealers were living in fear after a series of gangland murders, and the arrests of many who had surrendered to authorities and ceased selling drugs.

Kamnuan Chaiya, a village headman from Mae Hong Son's Pang Ma Pa district, said many relatives and villagers who he had convinced to shun the drugs trade and attend army rehabilitation courses had been gunned down.

..Another local leader from the same district said 80 innocent people from his village had been forced by police to confess to trumped-up charges relating to marijuana possession.

``Community leaders and former drug users who joined rehabilitation courses were arrested after they returned to their villages,'' he said.

Campaign has torn some families apart

No explanation on killings from officials

Onnucha Hutasingh

Families are paying a high price for the government's war on drugs.They have been torn apart, with children paying for the supposed ``sins'' of their parents. Some families have lost both parents. Children have moved in with relatives. Some have pulled out of school early.This is the bitter aftermath of a three-month campaign in which more than 2,000 people were killed.

Damrong and Somsri Thanomworakul, a Hmong couple, were shot dead on a Chiang Mai highway on Feb 24 on suspicion they sold drugs, leaving behind three children. Feeling helpless, their oldest child Somsak, 20, quit his college studies.He left his Ban Hmong Mae Sa Mai home in Mae Rim district right after the funeral and no one has heard from him since.The second child, Jintana, 14, could not return to school to complete Mathayom 4. She is now staying with an uncle in Bangkok but no one knows if she is continuing with her studies.The youngest sister, Janthima, 8, moved in with another uncle who could not do much to support her as he already has five children of his own.
There has been no explanation why Damrong and Somsri were killed, nor has evidence come to light that the couple, vendors of hilltribe handicraft at Bangkok's Chatuchak weekend market, were drug dealers. Relatives insist they were innocent.

`They had to die to help make state drug suppression records look good,'' they said.The government measured the success of the three-month war on drugs by the number of drug traders killed or arrested in each province.

Winai Puseubpattana, the assistant village headman, said the couple were killed even though their names did not appear on the drug blacklist, while a listed major drug dealer faced only minor punishment _ a two-night stay behind bars at a local police station.

Their aunt, Chamaiporn, 36, said relatives were told not to seek help from the state.
``I don't want the children to accept help from the people who killed their parents,'' she said.

Mrs Chamaiporn agreed with the anti-drug policy but said that did not mean officials should be able to kill people.`They never cared to seek the truth. They only wanted to gun down people. The children are in shock. They can't understand why their parents had to be killed,'' she said.

Chalit Samtang, a 14-year-old Lisu boy who lost his father, Thongman, 34, in the campaign, said he knew what killed him.

`My father died not because he was a drug dealer or user. He died because authorities wanted to get one more point,'' Chalit said.

Thongman was shot in the head on Feb 21 while tending the family's lamyai orchard in Ban Huay Kiang San in Chiang Mai's Phrao district. Chalit's uncle, Wichai, said he had to get the boy out of school to work in the orchard.

Malee, 12, Chalit's younger sister, has been crying every day.

`I miss my father. If I see the man who killed him, I will ask why he had to do that. What did my father do to him?'' she said. The government has not said whether it would help families who lost their bread-winners in the campaign.

And again....
The drug business is going on as usual in Klong Toey, Thailand's biggest and oldest slum community, as key traffickers there are still being spared despite the government's war on drugs since February. An Interior Ministry report said 1,002 state officials had been blacklisted for involvement with drugs.

Poor education, joblessness and lack of family love is what really breeds these problems, she said.``They are not garbage that can simply be wiped away,'' she said. As methamphetamines are more expensive and now harder to find, many young addicts are actively turned to solvents, especially glue.


For more information, please contact Neil Hunt

neil.hunt@ukhra.org

Methadone Alliance 0208 374 4395
Or ring us at Black poppy 020 8968 3452 - 07946 819 834