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Public alarm is mounting over the soaring death toll in Thailand’s war on drugs and many have urged authorities to rethink their tactics. The all-out war against drugs launched by the Thai government at the beginning of February has prompted harsh criticism from international diplomats and the domestic press, but Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is unmoved. Amid the public outcry over the rising number of casualties and extra-judicial police tactics, he has been defiant, dismissing the bloodshed as "irrelevant", and rejecting all criticism of the anti-narcotics drive. In the process of attempting to eliminate all drugs from the Kingdom by April 30, officials have reduced the complex drugs issue to a simple conflict of good versus evil. "In this drug war, drug dealers must die. But we do not kill them," the PM said of the campaign. "It is a matter of the bad guys killing the bad guys." The death toll has been dramatic. Nearly 50 lives have been claimed each day since the campaign kicked off on Feb 1. Fatalities include women and 16-month old children. Thai police say most of those killed were drug dealers silenced by their own or rival gang members, adding only a couple dozen were killed by the police—all in self-defense. But many aren’t convinced. Critics blame the Thai Ministry of Interior for pressuring police and provincial governors to meet the targets set by the ministry’s blacklist of suspected dealers. Police and local officials have been awarded financial bonuses and other incentives for reaching the tally. Those who fail have been threatened with sacking or a transfer to one of the 3,000 inactive posts set aside by the government. "There are only two ways to meet this goal easily," explains Somchai Hamla-or, President of the Human Rights Committee of the Law Society of Thailand. "One is to arrest the suspect, but this doesn’t eliminate them from the blacklist until the suspect is prosecuted. So the quickest way to eliminate them from the list is that the suspect die by whatever means." By most statistical measures, the first month of the campaign was a success. Nearly 30,000 were arrested and at least 80,000 surrendered to police. But the growing public alarm over the estimated 1,300 deaths—leading some to call it the bloodiest period in modern Thai history—has compelled the government to quit releasing death figures to the public. But it may be too late to palliate the public’s anxiety. Tay Saysong, a Hmong villager from Nan province, says since Feb 1, the police have come to search his village every night, oftentimes checking the wrong homes and people. Though nobody has been killed in his village, they are still scared. "People are afraid to go anywhere at night. If they are out late, they don’t come home, and some don’t even sleep at night anymore." Human rights advocates and ethnic tribal organizations worry that ethnic minorities and the poor are particularly vulnerable to such police intimidation and other human rights violations. Ahpae Mafoe, an Ahka representative from the Inter Mountain Peoples Education and Culture in Thailand Association (Impect), an indigenous non-governmental developmental organization, says some blacklisted suspects have been killed even though they had used drugs only a few times, or because they are on the bad side of village headmen or a competing local political faction. Some innocent villagers have fled from the police in fear, only to be gunned down on suspicion. "Most of these people don’t have bank accounts, but save their money at home," says Ahpae of the mistaken killings and arrests. "So the police think they’re selling drugs. Even if you have a drug dealer’s number in your mobile phone, you can get arrested because [the police] never believe the tribals or the poor." Tay Saysong wonders why the police have been passing instant verdicts on the spot instead of allowing Thailand’s judicial system to level a decision. "We are a democracy. We need to let the courts decide who is guilty and who is not." Friends and families of the drug war’s victims have not been satisfied with police reports and forensic experts aren’t helping to clarify matters. Coroners are withholding information as to what kind of gun was used and where bullets hit the victim to help determine if professionals or amateurs carried out the killings. "Forensic experts have not been getting quick cooperation from police who investigate some of these cases," says Somchai, citing the example of a suspect who was killed while lying in a hospital bed in Tak province. "It makes it look like gunmen are roaming around all over the country, but no one has been arrested by the police.