Thailand Urged To Ease Forced Rehabilitation On Drug Addicts

BANGKOK, April 23 (TNA) - The United Nations has suggested that Thailand relieve forced rehabilitation on drug addicts, as the country has used the measure on as much as 65 per cent of 400,000 drug addicts. At a seminar on drug abuse and rehabilitation held in Bangkok Monday, Pitaya Jinawat, Director-General of the Thai Ministry of Justice's Rights and Liberties Protection Department, quoted the United Nations as reporting that Thailand has forced rehabilitation on 65 per cent of total 400,000 drug addicts in the country, and that only 25 per cent have undergone rehabilitation voluntarily and 13 per cent have taken rehabilitation during their legal punishment. The UN has, therefore, urged Thailand to end the forced drug rehabilitation but promoting the participation of addicts and their communities in the mission instead. The UN has also recommended that Thailand provide drug addicts with equal access to treatment like general patients and speed up procedures for tests of drug addiction to reduce the detention of drug addicts with drug traffickers. On the same occasion, Thai Justice Minister Pracha Promnok mentioned authorities' seizure of a number of mobile phones, tablet computers and narcotics in Sunday’s search at the Nakhon Si Thammarat Prison in the Thai South, saying that he has ordered the director-general of the Department of Corrections to intensify control on prisons and decisively punish corrupt prison staffs. (TNA)