US probes Transocean over ties to Burmese drug lords

Mizzima News, 16 Aug 2010
US-Swiss drilling company Tranoscean has admitted it is under investigation by the US Treasury over its “operations in Myanmar [Burma]”. The probe comes amid intense public scrutiny since its rig blew up in the Gulf of Mexico. The subpoena from the US government’s sanctions enforcement division came after Mizzima first reported in May, that Transocean’s US regulatory filings showed the firm was hired late last year to do drilling work in Burmese waters co-owned by a company controlled by Stephen Law, a junta crony businessman alleged by the US government and analysts to be a major drug-money launderer. Law’s Sino-Burmese father Lao Sit Han, aka Lo Hsing Han, is believed by US drug-trafficking analysts to have controlled one of Southeast Asia’s best-armed narcotics militias during the 1970’s. Full story