Thai cops seized $30m of crystal meth that was bound for Australia - hidden inn PUNCH BAGS.

Customs staff in the capital Bangkok were suspicious that such a large quantity of fighting equipment filling a shipping container was being sent down under - where demand for Muay Thai fighting gear is low.

They ripped open one of the packages and found the drug which is believed to have been produced in the notorious 'Golden Triangle' area of land between Thailand, Myanmar and Laos.

Officers unveiled the 193kg find at a conference on Thursday afternoon December 23. They said there were dozens of boxing punch bags in the shipment but the traffickers hid meth, also known as Ice, inside just 15 of them. It had a street value of 30 million US dollars, or around 45.5 million Australian dollars.

Thai customs official recreated the scene when they found the meth by slicing through a long cardboard box and then the red outer layer of the boxing punch bag, exposing the drugs hidden amongst the stuffing.

Speaking in the video, Australian Border Force Acting Superintendent Joel Carruthers said: 'Australia consumes around 11 tons of methamphetamine per year. So there's a market for it, and disrupting it offshore in countries such as Thailand is fantastic.

'Australia remains a destination country for illicit narcotics produced in the Golden Triangle and shipped through Southeast Asia, including Thailand.

'This detection is down to the diligence and intelligence driven work by Thai customs and its law enforcement partners.

'Thailand and Australia are close partners and Australia appreciates the strong work that Thailand is doing in combatting the drug trade.'

Thailand has become a notorious hub for drug production and trafficking. In the north of the country, the ‘Golden Triangle’ area shares borders with Laos and Myanmar, and has produced large amounts of opium since the 1950s but focus in recent years has shifted to the more profitable methamphetamine. Officials believe most of the meth is produced in the Shan State of Myanmar before being distributed through neighbouring countries where prices are higher.

In November 2020, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) began working with Thai officials ‘to disrupt the trafficking of precursor chemicals used for the illicit manufacture of synthetic drugs in the Golden Triangle’.