Opinion | How Myanmar’s Crystal Meth Is Upsetting India’s Strategic Calculus

Dr G Shreekumar Menon

The northeastern states of Manipur, Mizoram and Nagaland are facing acute frontline exposure to a surge in illicit drug production from Myanmar.

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India’s immediate neighbour in the North-East is Myanmar, whose crystal meth, or “ice", or “Burmese Ice", has become that country’s premier export of choice. Myanmar’s Shan State is not only the epicentre of drug production and trafficking but also engages in human trafficking, money laundering, arms trafficking and wildlife trafficking.

Myanmar is recognised and acknowledged by the United Nations as the world’s largest producer of methamphetamine. Driven by the country’s ongoing civil war and the lawless geography of the Golden Triangle, synthetic drug manufacturing has evolved from hidden mobile tents into heavily fortified, village-sized, industrial-scale clandestine drug laboratories or “super labs". The bigger facilities are able to switch production from drug to drug, using chemists largely brought from Taiwan. Many in the trade know these sites by a simple name: “The Machine".

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Myanmar’s new meth lords have upended the country’s economy. Entire towns rely on drug trafficking to survive, in a country where the majority of the population lives in extreme poverty. Warlords and militias have long controlled vast tracts of Myanmar. Some of the more infamous, such as former soldier Khun Sa, amassed billions of dollars, flooding the world with opium and heroin.

In recent years, control of the country has been sliced and diced even more. Following the 2021 military coup, Myanmar has descended into a chaotic civil war. A multitude of rebel factions, anti-junta forces and pro-military militias control different swathes of the country. Nearly all sides are accused of using narcotics proceeds to fill their war chests and fund their administrations.

Splinter groups have split from splinter groups, most of which fund their fight with drug money. Yaba and shipments of crystal meth are clandestinely routed through Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia into the Philippines, Japan, Korea, Australia and New Zealand. Each country now faces its own unique kind of meth epidemic.

The Golden Triangle – the remote, jungle-covered border region where Thailand, Myanmar and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic converge – has seen an exponential surge in the illicit manufacture and trafficking of synthetic drugs. The synthetic drug market in East and South-East Asia has continued to expand since 2025, with seizures of methamphetamine and ketamine both jumping dramatically, according to the latest report released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

The report, titled........

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