Illegal fuel

Diesel sold on the black market can bring profits of up to 200 per cent, it is understood.

Illegal vendors buy the marked oil from oil companies for about 90 cents a litre and resell it to drivers for about $3 a litre.

Leung Hung, chairman of the Hong Kong, Kowloon and New Territories Public and Maxicab Light Buses Merchants' United Association, estimated about 200 to 300 non-franchise public light buses bought marked diesel for about $3 per litre at illegal oil stations.

The price would be nearly half the normal rate of $5.88 a litre for light diesel oil.