Vietnam assists Cambodia to raise anti-drug capability

Major General Nguyen Phi Hung, Deputy Director General of the Ministry of Public Security’s General Police Department, said the training course is to make a new stride in drug prevention and control in each country and across the shared border, thus boosting overall crime fighting cooperation. 

Brigadier General Y Set, an officer of Cambodia’s drug prevention and combat national committee, said the course will provide valuable anti-drug information for the country’s law enforcement forces, promoting bilateral coordination in fighting drug crime. It will also help enhance the nations’ sound neighbourliness, traditional amity, and all-round cooperation. 

Despite joint efforts between anti-drug forces of Vietnam and Cambodia, drug crime across their shared border has complicated in recent years. Heroin, synthetic drugs and addictive substances are trafficked from Cambodia to Vietnam’s HCM City through small-scale border trade and inland waterways. 

Traffickers also use Vietnam as a transit point for drug to be shipped to other countries. Meanwhile, some international trafficking rings also operate across the Vietnam – Cambodia border. 

The training course on drug investigative techniques and strategies is part of a memorandum of understanding signed at the 15th bilateral meeting at the ministerial level on anti-drug cooperation in HCM City in December 2015.