POLICE SAY around 60 balls of an unidentified off-white substance were found inside the stomach of a fair-skinned Asian man – whose body was found on Sunday in a large bag in Bangkok’s Klong Ong Ang waste filter.

Institute of Forensic Medicine director Pol Maj-General Pornchai Suteerakune said yesterday they were doing further tests to determine what the balls, each of which weighed 10 to 50 grams, were.

It was believed the 155-centimetre-tall man may have been a drug runner attempting to smuggle illegal drugs via “body packing” – swallowing the substance in plastic bags or condoms to avoid police detection, he said.

A source at the institute said the substance was suspected to be crystal methamphetamine or “ice”.

Wounds on man’s body were not life-threatening, so it was suspected that he died from the drugs inside him bursting or leaking, the source said.

Another source from the police investigation said earlier he believed the substance in the man’s stomach was an illicit drug smuggled by “body packers” into a third country.

Police are checking information on Pakistani, Nepalese, Indian |and Bangladeshi passengers who arrived at Suvarnabhumi Airport over the last week, as some |witnesses claimed they saw the |bag with his body in it last Thursday.

A source at the Narcotic Suppression Division said the| gang may have used Thailand as a transit point for drug smuggling. It was suspected to have three routes for smuggling; from India or Nepal to China; from India, Nepal or the United Arab Emirates to store in Thailand before going to China; or from Malaysia through Thailand to China.

Acting city police chief Lt-General Sanit Mahathaworn said police were waiting to confirm what the substance was. He said investigators would check nearby areas and examine security camera footage to see if the killer(s) disposed of the body in the canal.

Deputy police spokesman Maj-General Songpol Wattanachai said they would take up to four days to probe the case.

The bag the body was found in also contained a bag of white powder, a pack of tobacco and a pack of betel nuts popular among Myanmar, Indian and Pakistani nationals.

It is believed the man died three days prior to the body being discovered near Samranrat junction in Phra Nakhon district.