Word: burma
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...cheap. But as the Latin connection begins to feel more and more heat, and if Turkey phases out remaining opium production under pressure from Washington, the drug trade is expected to swing increasingly to Asia, drawing on the vast surpluses of opium grown in the remote, misty hills of Burma, Thailand and Laos, source of 58% of the 1,200 tons of illicit opium the world produced last year. State Department narcotics experts already see several routes developing, including one to the U.S. via Hong Kong and Britain...
...Southeast Asia, the U.S. State Department has long been following the operations of one Lo Hsing-han, a Chinese of mysterious background who is said to enjoy absolute rule over drugs in the mountainous region of Burma, Thailand and Laos known as the Golden Triangle, the richest poppy-growing area in the world and the source of the Asian heroin now reaching the U.S. in growing quantities...
...trade in one way or another. But the effort has been frustrating. Many governments are not particularly receptive to U.S. pleas for cooperation and, as the Cabinet Committee report wryly observes, they are "regularly and skillfully exploited by the illicit international trafficker." The report unhappily notes that in Burma, where the annual opium harvest comes to a hefty 400 tons, the narcotics trade is "not viewed with great alarm." Authorities in Pakistan prefer to act as if their country's opium output, which runs as high as 170 tons a year, is really "quite small...
...ample surpluses in the total worldwide illicit production of opium-1,200 tons last year, enough to supply the U.S. market many times over. India, Pakistan and Afghanistan grow some 360 tons of illegal opium each year, most of which at present goes to Iran. The "Golden Triangle" of Burma, Thailand and Laos is the largest single opium-producing area (700 tons a year). Dealers there have been supplying U.S. troops in South Viet Nam, and it is open to question, the report notes, whether they will accept the loss of income brought about by U.S. withdrawal...
...background pointed toward the five-year project she has just completed with Fire in the Lake. Her late father, CIA Deputy Director Desmond FitzGerald, was an old Southeast Asia hand who learned about the problems of working with Asian troops when he trained a Chinese unit to fight in Burma under General Joseph Stilwell. Says Frankie: "He never knew whether they would follow him into battle when he gave the order." Her mother, former U.N. Delegate Marietta Tree, contributed some nuggets of worldly observation: "Never mistake a politician. Anyone who has been elected dog catcher thinks he can be President...