Chinese crew facing charges in Australia
Print Edition
FOURTEEN people suspected of belonging to an international drugs ring have been charged in Australia in connection with a A$200 million (US$144 million) seizure of methamphetamine, commonly known as ice, police said yesterday.
They include eight Chinese crew of a commercial fishing boat. The other six are Malaysians.
Border forces detected the boat off Australia’s west coast on April 27, but when it was boarded at sea several days later no drugs were found.
Police said their inquiries led instead to two properties in Western Australia state capital Perth with 150 kilograms of methamphetamine found in one and 50 kilograms in the other.
“It will be alleged in court that the people charged today were part of an organized criminal syndicate that facilitated the transport of the drugs from the fishing boat to Western Australia via small watercraft,” police said.
The Malaysian nationals, aged from 24 to 54, and the Chinese, aged between 37 and 56, have been charged with commercial drug importation, offences that carry a maximum penalty of life imprisonment.
Police called it the biggest seizure of the drug in Western Australia this year. They said they would claim in court they had disrupted and dismantled a significant organized crime network.
Australian Federal Police acting Assistant Commissioner David Stewart praised cooperation between law enforcement agencies in targeting drug trafficking by increasingly complex criminal syndicates.
“The globalization of crime has become so complex that the law enforcement response requires a high degree of sophistication and collaboration in order to combat transnational crime networks,” he said.
Police said the boat was tracked after it was spotted off the coast, and escorted to Geraldton, some 400 kilometers north of Perth.
Australia has launched a A$300 million strategy to combat ice after a government report revealed the country has proportionally more users than most nations. It showed that the use of the drug had doubled since 2007 to more than 200,000 people in 2013.
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