Fentanyl and Chinese traffickers presents new challenges for B.C. RCMP, experts say

LINDA GIVETASH, THE CANADIAN PRESS
More from Linda Givetash, The Canadian Press

Published on: February 26, 2017

More t

VANCOUVER — Illicit drugs have always been a problem in port cities, but experts say the emergence of highly potent synthetic opioids that are fuelling B.C.’s overdose crisis are slipping through borders in new ways, presenting challenges for law enforcement.

International regulations, online ordering and the potency of the drug are among the factors making it difficult to prevent the drug from slipping through Canada’s borders.

More than 1,000 people have died from illicit drug overdoses in B.C. since January 2016, many as a result of the powerful opioids fentanyl and carfentanil, which largely comes from China, police say.

Canada Border Services Agency says seizures of fentanyl at the Vancouver International Mail Centre have more than doubled to 54 last year from 23 in 2015.

But RCMP national drug program coordinator Sgt. Luc Chicoine said while lives are saved with every seizure, there’s no knowing how much of a dent every confiscation of drugs makes.

“For example, if we seize 100 kilos of a certain drug that’s coming into the country, was it only 100 kilos coming in or was it a million kilos?” he said. “We don’t have the capability of identifying what is the full scope.”

The high potency of fentanyl has allowed traffickers to transport smaller quantities with other imports, on individuals or through the mail, making it harder for agencies to detect.

Chicoine said people trafficking cocaine would need to bring in large quantities. Three-quarters of a kilogram of pure cocaine once diluted would only produce one to two kilos for street distribution.

“While fentanyl, by bringing in 100 grams of it, you can cut it 10 to 15 times and you can have one to one and a half kilos of the substance,” he said.

He said the combination of high potency and today’s technology means users or dealers can now order illicit substances from China online and have it delivered straight to their door, making it harder for police to intercept.

Canada Border Services Agency said in a statement that detecting illicit substances is a priority, and all packages coming into Canada are opened and inspected if necessary before going through the mail system.

The agency said it’s waiting on legislative changes now before Parliament that would allow officials to open and inspect mail weighing less than 30 grams, a practice currently prohibited due to privacy concerns.

Chicoine said Vancouver’s proximity to China has made it the centre of Canada’s overdose crisis because it’s often the first landing point for opioids entering the country.

The RCMP have long had a relationship with Chinese officials, which was renewed last fall, to investigate crime between the countries. But fentanyl use has not been a problem in China, giving little incentive for officials to crack down on its manufacturing there, Chicoine said.

China announced earlier this month that it would outlaw the substance carfentanil and three other synthetic opioids, but it unclear how that will influence international trafficking.

Thomas Kerr, addictions researcher and professor of medicine at UBC, said it’s no accident Vancouver’s geography is playing into the overdose crisis.

“People who work in the area of drug policy have known for decades that no matter which continent you are on, port cities tend to have a higher availability of a greater diversity of drugs, and that those drugs also tend to be more potent,” he said.

Simon Fraser University criminology professor Neil Boyd said the use of opiates in the Vancouver area dates back to the late 1800s.

Smoking opium was the recreational drug of choice in China at the time, he said, and was brought to B.C. with migration and trade.

He said the drug didn’t become illegal until the early part of the 20th century, and even then, public health was not the concern behind the law. Moral attitudes about opioids in Western countries, including Canada, drove prohibition, Boyd said.

Vancouver police spokesman Staff Sgt. Randy Fincham said the department has seen waves of different drugs come and go but the arrival of fentanyl in 2012 has brought the most devastating death toll.

Despite the effect the drug is having on the community, he said police are not cracking down on street-level dealers, many of whom are vulnerable people struggling with substance abuse.

Instead, he said police are targeting those “quite a few hands up the chain, who are importing, manufacturing, cutting and distributing fentanyl to these other people at the street level.”

Investigating the “bigger fish” involved in trafficking is much more challenging, Fincham said, and requires more time, staffing, police resources and coordination with other law enforcement including the RCMP.

The high cost and uncertain outcomes has some experts saying that policing is the wrong solution for stopping the flow of drugs.

“Those kind of supply control interventions, they’re incredibly expensive, very time consuming and they have limited impact. The answer is demand reduction,” said Kerr.

Reducing demand requires high quality addiction treatment programs, Kerr said, which is sorely lacking.

“It’s not even a question of the system being broken, the system doesn’t exist,” he said.

Identity and Inequality reporter...what's that!...Orwellian

Identity and Inequality  reporter...what's that!

Authors

Jennifer Yang

• @jyangstar
• jyang@thestar.ca
• Facebook Page

Jennifer Yang is the Toronto Star’s Identity and Inequality Reporter.

WORRIED OVER TRUMP, CHINA TRIES TO CATCH UP WITH U.S. NAVY

BY REUTERS ON 2/26/17 AT 7:13 AM

The PLA Navy is likely to secure significant new funding in China's upcoming defense budget as Beijing seeks to check U.S. dominance of the high seas and step up its own projection of power around the globe.

China's navy has been taking an increasingly prominent role in recent months, with a rising star admiral taking command, its first aircraft carrier sailing around self-ruled Taiwan and new Chinese warships popping up in far-flung places.

Read more: How China can win as America turns inward

Try Newsweek for only $1.25 per week

Now, with President Donald Trump promising a U.S. shipbuilding spree and unnerving Beijing with his unpredictable approach on hot button issues including Taiwan and the South and East China Seas, China is pushing to narrow the gap with the U.S. Navy.

"It's opportunity in crisis," said a Beijing-based Asian diplomat, of China's recent naval moves. "China fears Trump will turn on them eventually as he's so unpredictable and it's getting ready."

Beijing does not give a breakdown for how much it spends on the navy, and the overall official defense spending figures it gives—954.35 billion yuan ($139 billion) for 2016—likely understates its investment, according to diplomats.

China unveils the defense budget for this year at next month's annual meeting of parliament, a closely watched figure around the region and in Washington, for clues to China's intentions.

China surprised last year with its lowest increase in six years, 7.6 percent, the first single-digit rise since 2010, following a nearly unbroken two-decade run of double-digit jumps.

"Certainly, the PLA Navy has really been the beneficiary of a lot of this new spending in the past 15 years," said Richard Bitzinger, Senior Fellow and Coordinator of the Military Transformations Programme at the S.Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore. 

"We don't how much they spend on the navy, but simply extrapolating from the quantity and the quality of things that are coming out of their shipyards, it's pretty amazing." 

The Chinese navy, once generally limited to coastal operations, has developed rapidly under President Xi Jinping's ambitious military modernization. 

It commissioned 18 ships in 2016, including missile destroyers, corvettes and guided missile frigates, according to state media.

Barely a week goes by without an announcement of some new piece of equipment, including an electronic reconnaissance ship put into service in January.    

Still, the PLA Navy significantly lags the United States, which operates 10 aircraft carriers to China's one, the Soviet-era Liaoning.

Xu Guangyu, a retired major general in the People's Liberation Army now senior adviser to the government-run China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, said China was keenly aware of the U.S. ability to project power at sea.

"It's like a marathon and we're falling behind. We need to step on the gas," Xu said.

Trump has vowed to increase the U.S. Navy to 350 ships from the current 290 as part of "one of the "greatest military buildups in American history", a move aides say is needed to counter China's rise as a military power.

"We’ve known this is a 15-20 year project and every year they get closer to being a blue-water navy with global aspirations," said a U.S. administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

"What you have seen this last year and what I think you will see with the new budget is that they are moving ahead with the short-term goal of being the premier naval force in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, with the mid-term goal, of extending all the way to the Indian Ocean."

In January, China appointed new navy chief, Shen Jinlong, to lead that push.

Shen has enjoyed a meteoric rise and is close to Xi, diplomatic and leadership sources say.

"The navy has gotten very lucky with Shen," said a Chinese official close to the military, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Now they know for certain their support goes all the way to the top."

Recent PLA Navy missions have included visits to Gulf states, where the United States has traditionally protected sea lanes, and to the South China Sea, Indian Ocean and Western Pacific, in what the state-run website StrongChina called Shen's "first show of force against the United States, Japan and Taiwan".

Related Stories

• China Warns the U.S. Over Patrols in South China Sea
• China Counts Win on Taiwan But Battles Loom With Trump
• Beijing Is Becoming the Global Champion of Free Trade

Last month, a Chinese submarine docked at a port in Malaysia's Sabah state, which lies on the South China Sea, only the second confirmed visit of a Chinese submarine to a foreign port, according to state media. 

The submarine had come from supporting anti-piracy operations off the coast of Somalia, where China has been learning valuable lessons about overseas naval operations since 2008.

Chinese warships have also been calling at ports in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar, unnerving regional rival India.

"It's power projection," said a Beijing-based Western diplomat, of China's navy.

Is China The last Superpower?

Digital [fiat] Currency, China

Made in China, Substandard Tyres

2 Chinese Arrested Over N5B Worth Of Substandard Tyres In Lagos

Two Chinese, Tanlong Shen and Xu Jing Yao have been arrested for importing substandard tyres valued at N5billion.

According to a report by Daily Trust, Shen and Yao’s investment were confiscated by the Standard Organisation of Nigeria (SON).

It was further reported that during a tour led by the SON Director General, Osita Aboloma, to Satellite Town, Lagos, two million imported substandard tyres were seen in a warehouse situated beside the popular Navy Town in the area.

In his words, Aboloma said: “We acted on the intelligence we received from well meaning Nigerians. This was achieved as a result of inter-agency collaboration. The glory is not for SON alone.

You can see volume of tyres brought in and you can imagine the implication for our society if these tyres are let into the market,” he said.

Aboloma also said the sub-standard tyres which were shipped into the country from China, were post-dated to make them appear road worthy.

Chinese buyers ‘frustrated’ at property myths form Australian lobby group

JULY 30, 20158:40AM

The Gold Coast is the hot new location for Chinese buyers, but they’re frustrated at being blamed for rising house prices in the major cities.

CHINESE property investors are being taken advantage of by dodgy operators and discriminated against by the Australian public, a leading Chinese businessman has warned.

Wayne Tseng, the president of the Chinese Precinct General Chamber of Commerce, said coming from a country where individual and consumer rights were relatively new concepts, Chinese were often easy targets.

Mr Tseng, a former Liberal Party candidate who was born in Vietnam to Chinese parents and migrated to Brisbane in the 1970s, has founded a new group based in Melbourne, the Chinese Chamber of Property Investors, to represent local and foreign Chinese and inform them of their legal rights.

He told news.com.au both Chinese and Australian operators were guilty of bad behaviour.

“They have to navigate the complex procedure of buying or selling a property and unfortunately some of the operators do take advantage of the fact that the Chinese are not knowledgeable of the system,” he said.

Some of the behaviour reported to his group include buyers being charged commissions — which is common practice in China — and being given incomplete listing information to push particular properties.

“Even the banks, they’ll offer you a loan but say you have to buy insurance from us, which is not true, everyone has a right to decide,” he said.

He likened it to scammers who used to charge tourists to walk on the beach. “It’s just like the old days,” he said. “You don’t have to pay $10 to walk up the beach. I used to see it on the Gold Coast, I actually reported it to council.”

Wayne Tseng has founded the Chinese Chamber of Property Investors.Source:Supplied

Mr Tseng said members of the community felt “frustrated” at the current debate around foreign investment and accusations that they were responsible for rising property prices, and that their voices weren’t being heard.

“A lot of the ruling public sentiment is that [Chinese] are the ones pushing up prices, but in all honesty it’s only in defined pockets,” he said.

“What we do know is they are purchasing new developments, and their investment funds these developments, and the stamp duty that gets charged off each purchase goes to fund infrastructure.

“In a way they do feel a bit frustrated that they don’t have a voice.”

It comes as a new report by Propell National Valuers rejected the “urban legend” that foreign purchasers were responsible for the runaway growth in house prices.

According to Propell’s head of research Linda Phillips, foreign buyers target specific property ranges, mostly inner-city apartments and expensive properties in Sydney and Melbourne, with Brisbane also starting to attract some interest.

In those specific markets, Propell found foreign buyers had added around 5 per cent to values of prestige property in preferred suburbs only.

“If price increases were mainly the result of foreign buyer interest, then we would have expected Melbourne prices to increase at a rate closer to that of Sydney,” the report said.

“The fact that Sydney prices have increased at double the rate of Melbourne shows that most of the increase is due to the imbalance between supply and demand in Sydney.’’

Mr Tseng said the not-for-profit group employed three full-time people to direct investors to trusted conveyancers, advisers and real estate agents, and organised workshops and education seminars. It was also lobbying for better communication with the Foreign Investment Review Board.

“The various new rulings passed on by the FIRB are not well communicated to the Chinese community,” he said. “There needs to be a simple information dispatch. Currently there isn’t a central point where they can get information and ask simple questions about their eligibility.

“This is very dangerous.

Tensions rise as China defends missile sites in South China Sea

China has claimed sovereignty over approximately 90 percent of the South China Sea, a subject of hot dispute. (CCTV via AP Video)

Tensions rise as China defends missile sites in South China Sea

By JOEL GEHRKE (@JOELMENTUM) • 2/24/17 

China is defending the construction of surface-to-air missile sites in the South China Sea, a move opposed by the U.S. but one that could help consolidate its hold over one of the most important shipping lanes in the world.

"China has the right to deploy necessary defensive facilities on its territory in accordance with security requirement," Colonel Ren Guoqiang, spokesman for the regime's Ministry of National Defense, said Thursday. "It is the legitimate right of a sovereign state."

China has claimed sovereignty over approximately 90 percent of the South China Sea, a subject of hot dispute given that the waters flow between several neighboring countries carrying "half the world's annual merchant fleet tonnage," according to the National Interest. The increased military capabilities could give China an edge when negotiating with its smaller neighbors, even as they try to cut the United States out of the talks.

"China has indisputable sovereignty over relevant islands and reefs in the South China Sea and the adjacent waters," Ren said.

The surface-to-air missile sites, which were built on artificial islands constructed by the Chinese, angered U.S. policymakers when they were revealed this week.

"Building two dozen structures designed to house surface-to-air missiles clearly violates China's previous promises not to militarize this vital region, where $5.3 trillion of trade — $1.2 trillion of it from the U.S. — passes each year," Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, a member of the Armed Services Committee, said this week. "The U.S. military should continue to fly, sail and operate in the South China Sea, and everywhere else international law allows. China's attempts to restrict access to this critical region should not be tolerated by the U.S. or our allies."

Chinese state-run media published a column deriding "foreign media's hype of China's militarization in the South China Sea" on Thursday. "It is rooted in self-interest and ulterior motives," the Xinhua commentary said.

The United States doesn't have a direct claim in the South China Sea, but has supported the Philippines — a former U.S. colony — in the controversy and defended the principle of freedom of navigation. To that end, an American aircraft carrier group sailed through the disputed waters earlier this week.

"We are not going to challenge China's possession of any of these land features in my judgment," former assistant secretary of defense Chas Freeman told Reuters. "If that's going to happen, it's going to be done by the Vietnamese, or ... the Filipinos ... or the Malaysians, who are the three counter-claimants of note."

CHARLES BURTON

A Chinese minister goes off script

CHARLES BURTON

Special to The Globe and Mail

Published Thursday, Jun. 02, 2016 

Charles Burton is an associate professor of political science at Brock University, and a former counsellor at the Canadian embassy in Beijing.

------------------

In Ottawa on Wednesday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi lashed out angrily at a reporter’s question that mirrored Canadians’ concerns about human rights and China’s seizing of disputed regions of the South China Sea. His fiery response revealed the difficulty Chinese diplomats have in convincingly representing their government’s position.

The journalist specifically asked about China’s detention of a Canadian missionary on charges of espionage. Of course, the minister knows as well as any of us that there is no evidence that Kevin Garratt was a military spy for Canada as alleged, and that China’s jailing of him since 2014 without due process is a flagrant violation of international law. Mr. Wang could have sidestepped the question and offered something in line with what Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Stéphane Dion, had said moments earlier – that the Garratt matter should be resolved through diplomatic protocols to which both Canada and China are signatory.

But Chinese diplomats are well practised in parrying diplomatic démarches about human-rights matters, and equipped with detailed talking points. When pressed too hard, they are programmed to bang the negotiating table and storm out in feigned high dudgeon.

The fact is, the discourse spouted by China’s Communist regime is severely at odds with the perceptive, informed social values of modern Chinese citizens.

The credibility vacuum can be seen in the fact that Chinese President Xi Jinping publicly blames every sort of ill on “bourgeois Western ideology,” with its democracy and freedom of expression, but privately sends his daughter to university in the United States.

Mr. Wang must be similarly conflicted. It is much easier to be a diplomat for Canada than a diplomat for China. He would probably feel more comfortable on the other side of the table representing the Canadian position than his own. It must all be very stressful for Mr. Wang and his colleagues.

CHARLES BURTON

The murky world of Chinese influence

CHARLES BURTON

Special to The Globe and Mail

Published Wednesday, Jun. 17, 2015

Charles Burton is an associate professor of political science at Brock University in St. Catharines, and is a former Counsellor at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing

Revelations that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service suspects Ontario cabinet minister Michael Chan has been under the undue influence of the government of China are unfortunately indicative of larger, very serious issues in how China engages influential Canadian public servants to serve the purposes of the Chinese regime.

We now know that there has been a high frequency of telephone calls between Mr. Chan and China’s Consul-General in Toronto. If the government of Canada knows what they were talking about, it is withholding this information for security reasons. But it is unlikely that CSIS would have approached the premier of Ontario with its concerns about Michael Chan’s relationship with the foreign diplomatic agents unless there was something that seriously concerned our people who monitor the activities of Chinese diplomats in Canada.

Mr. Chan has close associations with Canadians who have business interests in China. He has played a lead role in trade missions to China to create opportunities for them to make money in the country’s largely state-controlled economy; and he has also been a key figure in collecting campaign support for candidates of Mainland Chinese origin, such as Geng Tan, now a federal candidate in Don Valley North.

It stands to reason that people Mr. Chan assisted with China trade deals would also be donating to campaign coffers of the ethnic Chinese political candidates with pro-China sympathies that Mr. Chan is supporting.

The disturbing common thread through this is Chinese regime money being used to influence politics in Canada. There are good reasons why political parties cannot accept political donations from foreign sources.

Is there a belief that some Chinese immigrants remain partial to Beijing and furtively respond to manipulation by Chinese “Motherland” representatives stationed at diplomatic posts in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal? Mr. Chan, who was born in Guangdong and moved to Canada from Hong Kong as a young adult in 1969, indicated in an interview with the Xinhua News Agency in 2008 that he has returned to China more than 70 times since the early 1980s. That amounts to a lot of time away from Canada. But while ethnic loyalties may well be at play here, the matter connects to a larger question of the influence of Chinese money in Canada in general.

After all, it is not just ethnic Chinese in Canada who are alleged to have been inveigled to transfer Canadian military and economic secrets to agents of the Chinese state. Chinese intelligence operatives target anyone who can help the regime realize its interests abroad, regardless of race. The “flirtatious” relationship between Bob Dechert, parliamentary secretary to then-foreign affairs minister John Baird, and the much younger Xinhua “journalist” Shi Rong suggests that it is not only ethnic Chinese politicians who may cause CSIS concern.

Indeed, it’s worth noting that Canadian officials and politicians who favour closer economic relations with China – playing down concerns about human rights, espionage, unfair trade practices, support for repressive Third World regimes and so on – have generally not been of Chinese origin. It’s troubling that many of these same people, after they leave politics, end up making serious money in China-related trade or lucrative China-related board of directors’ appointments. This most recently applies to Mr. Baird himself and very much so to his predecessor David Emerson, but also to former prime ministers, former Canadian ambassadors to China and many others, of all political stripes. Chinese money is seemingly welcomed almost everywhere in Canada, but it inevitably comes with strings attached: expectations of reciprocal “friendship” that lead back to the Chinese Communists and their ever-more influential global business conglomerates headquartered in Beijing.

This is not a reciprocal relationship. It is unlikely that there are many telephone calls going on between any of our consuls-general in China and influential Chinese political actors comparable in rank to our Michael Chan.

Canada could be managing these concerns much better. The Chinese money is there, but not the Canadian political will.