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Drugs crime on the rise in China

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-02-25 23:20

BEIJING  -- China's drug enforcement authorities saw an increase in drug-related crimes last year with about 73,000 people arrested in more than 62,000 cases. 

Chinese drug addicts undergo the latest rehabilitation method using music to relax, at a drug rehabilitation center in Fuzhou, East China's Fujian province 15 February 2007. [Agencies]

Their narcotics seizures included 4.3 tonnes of heroin, 5.5 tonnes of crystal methamphetamine, or "ice", and 5 tonnes of ketamine, the National Narcotics Control Commission (NNCC) said in a statement issued Tuesday.

Law enforcement officers around the country cracked 1,565 drug-dealing rings and 244 illegal drug factories last year, the NNCC said.

The number of drugs cases was 9.2 percent up from 2007, while the number of arrests rose 7.7 percent.

While the numbers of drug-dealing gangs dealt with increased by 26.5 percent and the number of production plants was 86.2 percent up.

The NNCC said local police forces handled 2,785 cases in which 1.7 tonnes illegal drugs were smuggled from the "Golden Triangle" on the junction of Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam, into southwest China's Yunnan Province.

Authorities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong and Xinjiang had focused on detecting heroin from the "Golden Crescent", Asia's other major drug production area spanning Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan.

The local authorities seized about 400 kg of heroin smuggled from the Golden Crescent last year, the NNCC said.

Seventeen professional rehabilitation centers had been established across China, emphasizing the welfare of addicts so as to prevent relapses, the statement said.

The authorities had compulsorily isolated 218,000 Chinese addicts for rehabilitation in the centers last year, it said.

Drug enforcement agencies also enhanced cooperation with international counterparts in fighting overseas drug sources, it said.

Comprising officials from the ministries of foreign affairs and public security and 21 other government agencies as well as the Supreme People's Court and Supreme People's Procuratorate, the NNCC leads the country's anti-drug campaign.