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U.S. nabs Burmese heroin kingpins



Friday June 27 7:16 PM EDT 

U.S. nabs Burmese heroin kingpins

By SID BALMAN Jr. UPI Diplomatic Writer 

WASHINGTON, June 27 (UPI) _ U.S. marshals are flying back to the United
States with two of
Burma's most notorious heroin smugglers handcuffed to their seats. 

American officials tell United Press International under conditions of
anonymity that the secret
operation became possible after Thai officials holding Wei Ming and Chang
Yin Lung, top
lieutenants of Burmese drug lord Khun Sa, agreed to extradite the indicted
narcotics traffickers. 

The two suspects, who will be arraigned in the federal court for the eastern
district of New York
shortly after arriving in the United States Friday night, have been indicted
on charges related to the
heroin smuggling operation they helped mastermind and run out of Southeast
Asia. 

Liu and Chang, ethnic Chinese working for Khun Sa in Burma, were arrested
last year by Thai law
enforcement officials in an operation known as Tiger Trap. Although the wily
Khun Sa eluded
capture, 19 of his associates were arrested and are now languishing in jail
awaiting trial or
extradition. 

Later today, the State Department praised Thailand for its cooperation in
the matter. Department
spokesman John Dinger said, ``The United States wants to thank the Royal
Thai government for
its superb cooperation in helping bring Liu and Chang to justice.'' 

More than 70 percent of the world's opium supply _ roughly 4,000 metric tons
according to the
State Department _ is grown and processed in the Golden Triangle, a region
encompassing several
hundred square miles of northern Thailand, eastern Burma, southern China and
western Laos.
Nearly 90 percent of heroin, which is derived from processed opium, consumed
in the United
States originates in the Golden Triangle. 

Khun Sa, a modern-day Asian warlord who commands a formidable army of
several thousand hill
tribesmen and the descendents of expatriate Chinese soldiers who remained in
Burma following
World War II, controls the opium trade in Burma. 

Armed with such modern weapons as AK-47 assault rifles, hand grenades, land
mines and
sophisticated communications gear, Khun Sa's troops routinely drove mule
trains laden with opium
or heroin into Thailand for illicit export. 

Several American administrations have accused the powerful Thai military of
complicity in the
operation and repeatedly called on Bangkok to crack down on
narcotics-related corruption in the
armed forces. U.S. officials say Operation Tiger Trap, to which the U.S.
Drug Enforcement
Administration supplied intelligence and logistics assistance, was the first
major effort by Thailand
to cooperate with Washington's efforts to stem the flow of heroin from
Southeast Asia to the
United States.