Chinese triads have sought foothold in Vancouver port operations

29May00 Chinese triads have sought foothold in Vancouver port operations Fabian Dawson, Staff Reporter The Province The Vancouver Port Authority ignored warnings about the Chinese business interests it was wooing in the 1990s -- allowing a number of questionable business connections to take root in the port, The Province has learned. In the mid-'90s, as courting efforts aimed at Chinese shipping giant Cosco went into overdrive, intelligence officials -- including local ports police -- sounded alarm bells about the conglomerate's questionable connections. The shipping line is intimately linked to the China International Trust and Investment Corp., a key fundraiser for the Chinese government and a technology-acquiring source for China's military. U.S. Senate investigators and Canadian intelligence officials have described Cosco as the merchant marine of the Chinese military. Its vessels have been caught carrying thousands of weapons into California and Chinese missile-technology and biological-warfare components into North Korea, Pakistan, Iraq and Iran, according to U.S. intelligence reports. Last summer -- two years after the ports police were disbanded -- the port signed a deal with Cosco to make Vancouver its gateway to North America. Cosco had chosen the only major port on the West Coast of North America without a dedicated police force. Port officials maintain they have no evidence Cosco is directly involved in any illegal activity and cannot recall receiving police warnings. Cosco officials have declined interviews. Police and immigration documents obtained by The Province show that, in the early '90s, Chinese mafia members or triads were attempting to infiltrate port operations. In one case, a man identified as Chan Chung Hiu applied for a visitor visa at the Canadian consulate in Hong Kong to come to Vancouver on Jan. 14, 1992. Chan said he was an advisor to a company that had concluded a deal with the B.C. government to take over operations at one of the docks. Background checks conducted found that Chan was a member of the notorious Sun Yee On triad and had served a four-year jail term for armed robbery in Hong Kong. Chan abandoned the application after being asked to produce a police certificate. In another case, members of the same triad group, who are among the world's biggest heroin traffickers, were seen entertaining a senior officer of the now defunct Co-Ordinated Law Enforcement Unit. The party aboard a yacht was hosted by a Vancouver-based shipping company suspected of having links with the Chinese mafia.