According to international news sources from Vietnam, the Philippines and many more, Philippine customs and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA) seized an enormous amount of 276 kilos of the drug “crystal meth” worth 1.8 billion pesos (approx. 30 million Euros). The drugs were hidden inside tea packs and then were packed into bigger sacks for shipment in a container.
PDEA General Director Aaron Aquino received the information that huge amounts of illegal drugs were on its way from Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City port to Manila from his Vietnamese counterpart in Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City on the evening of 22 March 2019 (Philippine local time), he says.
In the past few years, the Philippine government launched a determined fight against drug trafficking and usage. In this Southeast Asian country, crystal meth is called “shabu” and is mostly being used by poorer addicted people.
Just the day before, Vietnamese authorities found 300 kilos of crystal meth at Hasan Trade and Service Limited Company in the Bình Tân District of Saigon/Ho Chi Minh City. According to the C04 department of Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security, this amount of crystal meth comes from the so-called “Golden Triangle”, passed Laos and then were handed over to 50-year-old Chinese citizen Huang Zai Wen at Hasan Trade and Service Limited Company. It was planned that Wen shipped the drugs together with other products of his company to Taiwan.
On 24 March 2019, Ngô Thanh Bình, deputy director of C04 department, told Tuổi Trẻ newspaper that the 276 kilos of crystal meth were shipped from Cát Lái port of Saigon/Ho Chi Minh city before being seized by Philippine authorities.
Nguyễn Thanh – VD-News
Translation: Hoàng Chính – VD-News
