Interior Minister Sar Kheng has asked businesspeople to help fund Cambodia’s ongoing drug crackdown

– including rehabilitation.

“In the future, the government wants to create rehab centres for the nation that can treat more than 2,000 drug users. So we really need any support from the private sector,” Kheng told a meeting with leading businesspeople in Phnom Penh on Friday.

The National Authority for Combating Drugs (NACD) last week announced that business tycoon Kith Meng would head a new Association for Rescue and Rehabilitation of Drug Addicts meant to reform Cambodia’s heavily criticised rehabilitation system. Meng declined to comment.

NACD chairman Ke Kim Yan also appealed to local communities, asking people to educate their family members on the dangers of drugs and help avoid addiction. “The family is very important in keeping people from using drugs and helping to rehabilitate the drug addict at home before sending them to the drug rehab centre,” Kim Yan said.

Kheng reported that in the first three months of the ongoing drug crackdown, police have made 2,674 busts, arresting 6,066 suspects.