Despite Sri Lanka’s robust maritime security approach countering trafficking, the evolving dynamic of organised crime continues to pose significant challenges to national security. Sri Lanka’s narcotics abuse problem has a long history of reactive action by the Government, with little being done to address threats before they grow into major challenges. 

Over the last decade, Sri Lanka’s counter narcotics supply efforts have predominantly focused on the heroin/methamphetamine inflows from the ‘Southern route’ via the Afghanistan-Iran-Pakistan axis of the ‘Golden Crescent’ region and cannabis inflows from South India, across the Palk Straits. The long-term efforts have yielded good results, with the Sri Lanka Navy, Coast Guard, Intelligence agencies and some segments of the Law enforcement building an effective human network, both locally and regionally to counter the persistent threat. 

However, the narcotics industry, like any other, thrives on innovation and change, creating new threats for the Indian ocean island. One such threat that is looming on the horizon (From the Bay of Bengal) is methamphetamine in both forms of ‘Crytal Meth’, and in tablet form, which is cheap and relatively easy to manufacture, and transport called ‘Yaba’. Yaba is increasingly being trafficked around the coastal states of the Bay of Bengal. Another is ‘Shan,’ a name coined for crystal methamphetamine from the ‘Golden Triangle’ region (Myanmar, Thailand, and Laos). Over the last few years, Yaba pills have been trafficked in the hundreds of thousands cross-border and across the Bay of Bengal. Internal conflicts in Myanmar and cross-border trafficking between Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Vietnam have been seen as drivers of Yaba and Shan in the Bay of Bengal region. Yaba has already become a serious narcotics problem in Bangladesh and Southeast Asia. According to the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime (UNODC), unlike geographically confined, crop-based drugs, such as opium in Afghanistan or cannabis in South India and Sri Lanka, synthetic drugs like Yaba can be produced anywhere in the world where there are weaknesses in law enforcement and chemical regulations. The portable and clandestine nature of production also makes it difficult to monitor and assess the situation systematically. Over the last year, increasing volumes of Yaba pills and Shan have been intercepted by Indian authorities, particularly in states that border Bangladesh, like Assam. Both varieties of the narcotic have also been detected being smuggled in traditional fishing vessels across the Bay of Bengal. 

The synthetic drug market in East and Southeast Asia continues to grow at concerning levels, as organized crime groups leverage gaps in law enforcement and governance challenges to traffic large volumes of drugs and expand their production, a 2023 report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) indicated. The report, titled “Synthetic Drugs in East and Southeast Asia: latest developments and challenges 2024”, confirms that 190 tons of methamphetamine was seized in East and Southeast Asia in 2023 – a record level. After dropping slightly in 2022, seizures of methamphetamine rebounded in 2023 to the highest amount ever recorded for the region. “The drug trafficking and production situation has become increasingly complex,” Masood Karimipour, UNODC Regional Representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific has stated, adding that “Organized crime groups are lowering the production costs and scaling up production by using non-controlled chemicals. With scaled-up production, shipments involving over one ton of drugs have become more frequent, which in turn leads to further price drops as availability and affordability increase.”

Given that a group of Burmese refugees drifted to Sri Lankan waters recently and the vast expanse of the Bay of Bengal in which Sri Lankan fishermen fish, the risk of Yaba and Shan making landfall may not be a distant possibility. The risk of the low-cost drug making inroads into Sri Lanka from the East Coast or the Northern Coast of the island (which is already a well established cross Palk Strait smuggling route), become more than a remote possibility, with reports of the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) yesterday (27) seizing what is reported to be their biggest haul of illicit drugs when they stopped a fishing boat smuggling 5.5 tonnes of methamphetamine from war-torn Myanmar. According to reports, an ICG air patrol spotted a small fishing boat in the Andaman Sea which had been “operating in a suspicious manner.” The suspect vessel was seized by the ICG with a crew of six Myanmar citizens when they entered Indian territorial waters, the ICG said. “The boarding party found approximately 5,500 kilograms of prohibited drug methamphetamine. The seizure is the biggest-ever drug haul by ICG, highlighting its commitment to safeguarding Indian territorial waters” the ICG is reported to have said. 

As such, Sri Lanka can’t afford to let down its guard, especially on maritime security and law enforcement. It remains unclear if the current government will proceed or alter the Defence Review 2030 report which was crafted by the previous government, aimed at evolving Sri Lanka’s national security and defence structure to face contemporary and developing threat spectrum, which the island nation is likely to face in the next decade or two. It would be prudent for the government not to halt the defence reforms agenda, and not to drift away from keeping security a policy priority.