US fentanyl seizures show China is not the main supplier, Beijing drugs official says
- China has made efforts to curb flow of the opioid, vice-commissioner of anti-drugs body says
- Liu Yuejin adds that the issue is ‘totally irrelevant’ to trade talks
China has hit back at US President Donald Trump’s accusations that it is the main source of fentanyl that has killed large numbers of Americans, saying that it has done its best to curb the trafficking of the substance.
In Beijing on Tuesday, Liu Yuejin, vice-commissioner of the Ministry of Public Security’s drugs control commission, said China had made efforts to curb the supply of fentanyl, including widening restrictions on the substance and cooperation with US law enforcers. It added all fentanyl-related substances to a controlled list from May, a measure intended to stop drug makers altering the chemical structure to get around existing regulations.
US officials have accused China of being the main source of illicit fentanyl and related substances that are smuggled into the United States.
Last month, Trump accused his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, of failing to meet his promises and of not doing enough to stop the flow of the potent synthetic opioid.
Citing statistics from the US government, Liu said that of 229 cases of trafficking in which 537kg (1,184lbs) of fentanyl-related substances were seized between last October and March, only 17 of them, involving 6kg of the substances, were found to have originated from China.
“Since the ban on May 1, the Chinese side has not found any criminal cases of trafficking fentanyl-related substances,” Liu said.
Fentanyl has been among the contentious issues between the two countries at a time when they have been locked in a protracted trade war. US and Chinese officials reportedly held a “working-level” meeting by telephone last Thursday during which Beijing said it was making progress in restricting outbound fentanyl shipments as it tries to persuade the White House to cut tariffs on Chinese goods.
But Liu said on Tuesday that although China had been working closely with the US on curbing the illicit flow of the substances, such efforts were “totally irrelevant” to the trade negotiations and the two issues “should not be mixed together”.
“The US has not properly solved the abuse of fentanyl in the United States, and never done a proper investigation on the origin of fentanyl. Instead, it throws mud at us,” he said.
“This is not the right way to solve the problem, and it should not be mixed with the China-US trade negotiations – it’s a totally unrelated issue.
“China has tightened the control over fentanyl-related substances, but there are more and more people in the US dying from [the drug]. This proves that China is not the main source of fentanyl.”
He added that China would conduct a crackdown across 12 provinces in the next three months, stepping up patrols and increasing checks at the country’s borders and of international mailing.
The Trump administration has railed against illegal imports of fentanyl from China as the US battles an opioid crisis. There were more than 70,000 drug overdose deaths in the country in 2017, with 68 per cent of them involving prescription or illicit opioids, according to the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.
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He has previously called fentanyl a “horror drug”, and has entwined the issue with the trade war with China. In December, Trump said that Xi had agreed during trade talks to take action over fentanyl exports.
The Chinese foreign ministry said last week that China had made “unprecedentedly intensive efforts” since the changes in May, and urged the US government to improve its domestic regulations to tackle the roots of the opioid crisis.
Mo Guanyao, a professor specialising in law and enforcement on drugs at Yunnan Normal University, said that the US accusation was groundless and China had imposed stricter controls over fentanyl.
“The Chinese president promised in his meeting with US President Donald Trump in December to make all fentanyl [variants] controlled substances and that measure has already been in place since May 1. What else does Trump want?” Mo said.
Additional reporting by Sarah Zheng
