POLICE believe they have paralysed a major faction of Hong Kong's largest and most powerful triad society, the Sun Yee On, after a two-year undercover operation ended in raids across the territory yesterday.
Officers who had masqueraded as triads since a 1992 infiltration of the society's Tsim Sha Tsui faction provided intelligence to about 350 police, who raided 70 addresses simultaneously.
The arrest of 14 alleged ringleaders - including a woman and some said to hold the rank of 426 Red Pole Fighters - was hailed by senior police, who described Operation Binaural as the most successful against triads in recent years.
Four other targets were on the run last night.
Those arrested are alleged to have been involved in about 80 cases of loansharking, extortion, wounding, criminal damage, drug trafficking, unlawful detention and recruitment of people into the triad society.
'We have secured sufficient evidence to prosecute more than 100 triad members for a wide variety of triad-related offences and other crimes,' Senior Superintendent (Crime) Kowloon West, John Thomson, said.