Two undercover police officers in Stung Treng province on Monday attempted to carry out a drug sting, but ended up letting five methamphetamine dealers escape into the forest, according to the provincial anti-drug police chief.
The officers agreed to meet five men in a forested area of Siem Pang district’s Sre Sambor commune at about 11 a.m. Monday to purchase 1,986 methamphetamine pills from them, according to Kong Kimsrun, the police chief.
However, after handing over the pills, the drug dealers caught on to the fact that the buyers were police officers and ran into the forest.
“We tried to scare them by shooting a few times, but they still escaped,” Mr. Kimsrun said. He attributed the operation’s failure to its “complicated location” in a heavily forested area, and the fact that five officers meant to provide backup were too far behind the undercover officers to provide assistance.
“The drug dealers required [us] to do it in the jungle near the border,” he said. “I am really very sorry that we could not arrest the drug dealers.”
