The National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) has given state authorities a one-month deadline to eradicate drug trafficking from prisons nationwide or take responsibility for the failure.
Deputy permanent secretary for justice Charnchao Chaiyanukit said yesterday the NCPO wanted drug trafficking at prisons to be "reduced to zero" within a month.
Authorities who fail to achieve the target will have to face the consequences, Mr Charnchao said.
He said the Corrections Department will transfer 200 major drug offenders to Khao Bin maximum security prison in Ratchaburi.
Police and soldiers will be asked to escort the prisoners and the transfer must be finished as quickly as possible, he added.
Mr Charnchao added the NCPO had told the Corrections Department to compile the names of prison warders suspected of being involved in drug trafficking at prisons, and to take action against them.
In Chumphon, prison officials and military rangers yesterday searched the Chumphon prison as part of a crackdown on drug trafficking. Dusit Chantsathit, the prison’s director, said the Corrections Department has instructed prisons nationwide to get tough on drug dealing.
Any prison directors who fail to stop inmates from dealing drugs from inside prisons will face punishment, Mr Dusit said.
Officials previously searched the Klongprem Central Prison in Bangkok as ordered by the NCPO.
They seized 16 mobile phones, 0.5 grammes of crystal methamphetamine, and some sharpened steel rods.
The NCPO is also asking commercial banks to investigate more than 400 accounts of clients who have been imprisoned and whose names appear on a list of money-laundering suspects.
Assistant army chief Gen Paibul Khumchaya, head of the NCPO’s judicial affairs sector, on Wednesday asked for cooperation from banks to report transactions from bank accounts belonging to more than 400 prison inmates to the Anti-Money Laundering Office (Amlo).
A list of inmates with bank accounts with unusual transaction flows was presented to the NCPO.
Amlo has also sent the banks a list of account owners who may be involved in money laundering, he said.
The banks have been warned not to allow inmates to conduct transactions which could be linked to money laundering while they are serving time behind bars, Gen Paibul said.
The bank themselves should take measures to ensure no dirty money is circulated in their systems, he said.
The military had a list of inmates who are suspected of dealing in drugs via phone from inside prisons, he said.
Amlo secretary-general Seehanart Prayoonrat on Wednesday said banks have also been told to monitor 1,100 bank accounts whose owners are suspected drug dealers and major players in the gambling racket.
But these names — which have been compiled by the Office of the Narcotics Control Board and the Narcotics Suppression Bureau — still need final verification from Amlo before being sent to banks nationwide, he said.
Banks must also classify suspected bank accounts into three groups of high, moderate and low risk, and submit reports to the Amlo for examination, he said.