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Al Jazeera
Al Jazeera
Health
Kevin Doyle

‘Tip of the spear’: Battling the Golden Triangle’s drug lords

A Thai soldier takes part in training at the port of Chiang Saen on the Thai side of the Golden Triangle in 2016 [File: Jorge Silva/Reuters]

Chiang Rai, Thailand – In the far north of Thailand, a deadly conflict is playing out between drug syndicates and Thai security forces working to stop a flood of narcotics from the region known as the Golden Triangle.

Drug shipment sizes are staggering and the body count rising in this low-intensity battle against increasingly sophisticated drug producers and traffickers. It is made all the more difficult due to the heavily-militarised and largely-lawless territory the producers and traffickers operate from in the Golden Triangle – located at the meeting point of the jungled borders of Thailand, Laos and Myanmar.

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