US indicts four Chinese companies for trafficking fentanyl ingredients
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US Attorney-General Merrick Garland announces actions to disrupt the fentanyl precursor supply chain, in Washington.
PHOTO: EPA-EFE
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WASHINGTON - The US government has charged four Chinese companies and eight Chinese individuals with trafficking in chemicals used in manufacturing fentanyl, Attorney-General Merrick Garland announced on Friday.
Two of the eight have been arrested as the US Justice Department intensifies its crackdown on the synthetic opioid
It is the first time Washington has charged Chinese companies over trafficking of fentanyl precursor chemicals inside the country, rather than shipping them to Mexico, the origin of most of the fentanyl found in the US.
The announcement came just days after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Beijing,
“These companies and their employees knowingly conspired to manufacture deadly fentanyl for distribution in the United States,” Mr Garland said.
“Just one of these China-based chemical companies shipped more than 200kg of fentanyl-related precursor chemicals to the US for the purpose of making 50kg of fentanyl, a quantity that could contain enough deadly doses of fentanyl to kill 25 million Americans,” said Mr Garland.
China’s Foreign Ministry on Saturday urged the US to stop using what it said were fentanyl-related pretexts to sanction and prosecute Chinese companies and citizens, and demanded the immediate release of those who were “illegally arrested”.
“China urges the US side to stop dumping blame and to stop smear attacks on China,” the ministry said in a statement.
Charged in three separate cases filed in federal court in New York were Hubei Amarvel Biotech, Anhui Rencheng Technology, Anhui Moker New Material Technology and Hefei GSK Trade.
The eight individuals charged included executives and employees of the four companies.
The two people arrested, both employees of Hubei Amarvel, were taken into custody by US officials and held in Honolulu, Hawaii, after they were expelled from Fiji on June 8.
Although Mexico has been the main source of fentanyl sold in the US, Washington has increasingly focused its attention on the Mexicans’ suppliers in China.
Pressuring Beijing
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is 50 times more powerful than heroin and much easier and cheaper to produce.
It has largely replaced heroin and prescription opioids like oxycodone
Fentanyl has become the leading cause of death for Americans between 18 and 49 years old.
In Indiana on Friday, US officials announced charges against 19 people involved in trafficking fentanyl.
Over the past year, the US Treasury has imposed sanctions on several Chinese chemical companies and individuals for supplying fentanyl ingredients to Mexican drug producers and traffickers.
“The two drug cartels that are responsible for the influx of fentanyl into the United States, the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels, work with chemical companies based in the People’s Republic of China to get their raw materials,” said US Drug Enforcement Agency Administrator Anne Milgram.
The issue has become an important one
Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is 50 times more powerful than heroin and has become the leading cause of death for Americans between 18 and 49 years old.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Before Mr Blinken’s trip, US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said Beijing was not doing enough about the problem.
“We have been pushing very hard that the government of China use its considerable power to shut down the ability of these black-market Chinese firms to sell the fentanyl,” Mr Burns said.
Chinese Embassy spokesman Liu Pengyu condemned the move as “a well-planned entrapment operation by the US side, which seriously infringed upon the legitimate rights of relevant enterprises and individuals”.
He said such “long-arm jurisdiction” would create more obstacles for China-US counter-narcotics cooperation.
Helping with recipes
The indictments unveiled on Friday said the Chinese companies and their employees were consciously selling their chemicals for fentanyl production, helping with recipes for the drug and offering newly refined chemicals that would help boost production of the opioid.
One of the companies, Hubei Amarvel, openly boasted on its website of selling fentanyl chemicals to the US and Mexico, one of the indictments said.
Hubei Amarvel also offered documentation on its website showing it shipped chemicals to Culiacan, the base of the Sinaloa Cartel, according to the indictment.
Meanwhile, Mr Blinken announced on Friday plans to host a virtual international conference on the threat of synthetic drugs on July 7.
“The United States has been the canary in the coal mine when it comes to synthetic opioids,” he said in a statement. “But we see this problem spreading, including especially in our own hemisphere.” AFP
