Pubdate: Fri, 19 Dec 2003 Source: Nation, The (Thailand) Copyright: 2003 Nation Multimedia Group Contact: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1963 POLICE LOWER DRUG-WAR DEATH TOLL TO 1,329 Police have revised downward the number of violent deaths during the first three months of the war on drugs from 2,921 to 1,329, claiming the rest of the killings were unrelated to drugs, a well informed police source said yesterday. The figures are part of a report compiled by Pol Lt-General Nawin Singhapalit, who is in charge of reinvestigating the unusually high death toll in the February 1 to April 30 drug war. The figures from the report are to be announced by police commissioner General Sant Sarutanond at 11am today. The government scrambled to recheck the figures after His Majesty the King said in his birthday speech that the administration should clarify the high number of deaths during the first phase of the government's war on illegal drugs. According to the source, Nawin's report states that a total of 2,921 deaths occurred in 2,656 murder cases during the three months. Of these, 58 cases involved confirmed extra-judicial killings by police while making arrests. There were 72 people killed in these incidents. Of the 58 cases, the report says, 12 were not related to drug suppression, and 15 people were killed in these 12 cases. The report says that 1,422 cases involving 1,502 deaths were not drug related. The police source declined to explain why these cases had been separated out or how many of them had been solved. The report says 1,329 people were killed in 1,176 incidents confirmed as related to the drug trade. The report says that only 23 out of the 1,176 confirmed drug-related cases had been solved and that 23 suspects had been arrested. For the rest, police still do not know who was behind the killings, it says. Sant has reiterated that drug-related killings were either "silencings" or "gangsters fighting amongst themselves". During the first phase of the war on drugs, police always shrugged off the rise in the number of murders, saying they were "silencings" or murders carried out on the orders of drug bosses to prevent the victim being linked to them. Human-rights activists suspect police initiated a terror campaign to intimidate drug traffickers. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom