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Thailand justice minister will review pardon criteria after drug lord release
The decision follows backlash after an 85-year-old drug trafficker was freed from maximum-security custody near Bangkok after royal pardons reduced his life sentence to below the nearly 10 years he served.
Thailand’s justice minister said on Tuesday that the government will review its pardon criteria after public backlash over the release of an 85-year-old drug trafficker who served less than a decade of a life prison term, according to SCMP Economy.
Laota Saenlee was arrested in 2016 by undercover officers for selling crystal meth in Thailand’s Golden Triangle region and was described as linked to powerful Myanmar drug kingpins, the outlet reported.
Organised crime groups move an estimated tens of billions of dollars worth of heroin, methamphetamine and ketamine annually from the Golden Triangle, according to the same report.
Thailand’s corrections department said Laota was released from a maximum-security prison just north of Bangkok on Friday after a series of royal pardons reduced his life sentence to below the nearly 10 years he served, and that local authorities would monitor him after release.