More than 50 per cent of the 23 youth “gangsters” who were arrested in Phnom Penh last week tested positive for narcotics, said a Ministry of Interior official.
“On the instructions of Prime Minister Hun Manet, during the period from May 23 to 29, the capital police intervened in 26 cases of anti-social behaviour by youth gangs. Our officers detained 23 people. As Phnom Penh is known as a source of drugs, it was decided to ask them to undergo testing. More than half of them were discovered to have drugs in their systems,” explained ministry spokesman Touch Sokhak.
The 23 arrested youths were among the 223 who were detained in 65 cases nationwide during the same period.
According to Sokhak, this represented almost twice the numbers reported in previous campaigns. Phnom Penh saw the largest number of cases.
He explained that the wayward youths will face administrative or legal action. Administrative measures include education, counselling and the signing of good conduct contracts, while those who are determined to have been involved in illegal activities will be sent to court.
The urine testing of the detained delinquents was carried out by the Phnom Penh Municipal Commission, under the oversight of Minster of Interior Sar Sokha.
Sokha instructed the capital and provincial administrations to pay closer attention to cracking down on youth crime, in conjunction with a nationwide investigation of drug offences.
Drug tests are also being conducted on sub-national level civil servants. Sokhak noted that he had not yet received a detailed report of the outcome of the testing.
A total of 56,445 officials had undergone the urine tests by April 29. 76 of them tested positive and were dismissed, according to the National Authority for Combating Drugs (NACD).
Recent urine tests on 2,715 civil servants in Battambang province returned 13 positive results.
In the first four months of the year, police in the province investigated 324 drug cases and arrested 565 suspects, 56 of them female. Of the cases, 227 involved trafficking or dealing, and 462 suspects were sent to court. The remaining cases involved drug use, with 103 drug users sent to rehabilitation centres, according to the interior ministry.
Nationwide, at least 9,000 people have been arrested and more than 4 tonnes of illegal drugs seized in the first five months of 2024, a significant increase from the same period last year.
