China and U.S. Resume Unprecedented Drug Enforcement Cooperation

After many years of restrained cooperation, the People’s Republic of China and the U.S. have taken bold new measures to combat international narcotics trafficking. The measures include: the establishment of a secret electronic surveillance post along China’s border with Burma to eavesdrop on narcotics trafficking from the Golden Triangle; the donation by the U.S. of several dozen jeep-like Humvee vehicles for narcotics interdiction in mountainous terrain along the Burmese border; the establishment by the U.S. of a secret fund for Chinese use to operate the surveillance center; the establishment of a Chinese-U.S. liaison group for law enforcement; and the prospective establishment of a real time e-mail between the U.S. and China to exchange information on drug trafficking and traffickers. Much of the cooperation is directed towards stopping the more than 90 percent of the heroin that flows through China from Burma... [more]