Chinese and Mekong cops team up against one of Asia’s biggest meth cartels
Chinese drug police are working with Mekong countries to strike at the heart of a mega-rich meth syndicate as the region targets top-level drug traffickers instead of street dealers.
The porous and lawless border areas of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos have for decades been a hub for heroin production, but the so-called Golden Triangle is now pumping unprecedented quantities of synthetic drugs like methamphetamine into the global markets, fueling a $61 billion drug trade.
In large part responsible for the dramatic shift to synthetic drugs is a mega-cartel known as Sam Gor, which U.N.’s Office on Drugs and Crime believes is Asia’s biggest crime syndicate. It is led by a Chinese-born Canadian citizen named Tse Chi Lop.
