Police arrested a 25-year-old Thai woman in Phnom Penh on Friday over allegations that she was working in tandem with the Peruvian national arrested last week at the Phnom Penh International Airport with nearly three kilograms of cocaine, police said yesterday.

“This Thai woman was a member of a drug-trafficking group hiding in Thailand,” said Brigadier General Sok Chour, deputy chief of the Ministry of Interior’s Anti-Drug Police Department. “She was sent by her ringleader in Thailand to receive the drugs from a Peruvian man in Phnom Penh.”

According to Chour, police used the Peruvian suspect to set up a fake meeting, where the Thai suspect was apprehended.

“She was arrested by our anti-drug police when she was telephoned by the Peruvian man after he was arrested by police, and came to get the drugs from him at a hotel in Phnom Penh,” he added.

The Peruvian man was first arrested at the Phnom Penh International Airport on May 7 with 10 metal tubes stuffed with a total of 2.9 kilograms of cocaine. He is suspected of having brought the drugs through Singapore and into Cambodia, where they would be transited onwards to Thailand. “They were charged by the court with keeping, transporting and trafficking drugs under article 40 of Cambodia’s Anti-Drug Law,” Chour said. “If they are found guilty, they will face punishments of up to a life sentence.”

The pair was still being detained at the Ministry of Interior he added, but was expected to be transferred to Prey Sar late yesterday afternoon.