Publicity

Heroin and other dangerous drug traffic are tearing out of a newly unshackled Myanmar and into booming, cashed-up China, infecting towns and big cities that have not experienced a rampant, deadly drug culture before. Beyond China, narcotics and amphetamines are streaming out to western markets.

China has become a huge supplier of pre-cursor chemicals for the manufacture of the frightening and ruinous drug ice and other new-generation drugs.

Correspondent Stephen McDonell takes us right into the heart of the tearaway trade, on patrol with China's drug police struggling against the tide of illicit drugs often carried by poor Myanmar mules prepared to risk everything for a couple of hundred dollars.

McDonell and cameraman Wayne McAllister slip across the porous border to observe the trade from its source, head into newly-afflicted communities where heroin and amphetamine use is metastasising and then head to the super-cities like Shanghai where, unlike previous generations, China's partying young are driving a booming market in so-called recreational drugs.

One credible report estimates the number of registered drug addicts has grown from 70,000 in 1990 to nearly 2 million a year or so ago. The number of regular drug users may be as high as 12 million. It's a massive new market for the drug dealers of Myanmar and beyond and if it continues to grow exponentially, it's a social, health and legal time bomb for Chinese authorities.

And as we'll discover that also presents as a worrying platform for authorities elsewhere fighting the scourge of international drug traffic.

Search and arrests

Music

00:00

MCDONELL: We're told China's off the boil - well here's a trade that's going absolute gang-busters.

00:03

Arrest of woman

 "She's successfully brought drugs across the border before and this is the second time she's done it".

00:10

Drug montage.  Party shots

The drug trade - flooding in to propel China's party scene and chasing all that new money.

00:14

Methamphetamine, ecstasy, heroin - tons of it, as drug culture spreads like wildfire.

00:24

McDonell holding bag of drugs, with man

"If you can get these drugs to Australia, you can imagine how much more profit there would be".

00:32

Driving to Myanmar border

Music

00:38

MCDONELL:  We're heading to seldom seen corners of this dramatically changing place as Foreign Correspondent investigates the other China boom, one that leads all the way to our own front door.

00:42

Barge on river

00:59

McDonell on barge

This is remote dramatic territory. A river forming part of a border that runs for thousands of kilometres between China and its emerging neighbour, Myanmar - what we used to call Burma. You might expect large fences and guards on patrol, but here the official borders of countries mean little to people who've travelled and intermingled for centuries.

01:05

McDonell on barge to camera

"Well this is a pretty porous border. As you can see there are lots of people moving back and forth across the river. We've just walked down here, jumped on the first boat there was, paid the guy, come along and here we are, now I'm in Burma!"

01:35

Unloading boats

Music

01:51

MCDONELL:  There's a brisk trade here. Myanmar has been opening up and China has an ever growing affluence. Yet to buy Chinese goods, poor Burmese farmers need money and in order to get money some are prepared to transport a very dangerous cargo to the north. With not an official in sight, the potential to ferry illegal drugs across points like this is clearly substantial.

"None of the people here speak Chinese so I

01:57

McDonell on barge

can't ask them how busy it is down here normally, but it seems like it's just boat after boat coming through and the trucks are bringing goods from Burma across to China and also back in the other direction".

02:34

View of bank from barge/McDonell on barge

The home of the Golden Triangle, Myanmar has long been a major source of the world's heroin. Now, on top of that, there are new drugs coming out of here and via China they'll end up as far away as Australia. So we've come here to follow the drugs and to gauge the size of a problem considered so serious it's recently led to joint operations by Australian and Chinese police.

02:47

Myanmar hill scenery

03:21

PROFESSOR WU JIANG: "The factories which produce drugs have increased..

03:29

Prof Wu Jiang

In other words they once produced heroin but now they've changed to produce ice-type drugs, amphetamine-type drugs"

03:37

MCDONELL: Former police officer Professor Wu Jiang is now one of China's foremost experts on the drug trade.

03:45

Myanmar hills

We ask him if Myanmar's increased ice production is in direct response to Chinese consumption.

PROFESSOR WU JIANG: "That's correct. It's because of supply and demand. The key point is they must know there are so many people in China who are selling drugs.

03:52

Prof Wu Jiang. Super:
Professor Wu Jiang
Yunnan University

They've established networks with them. There are also a lot of unspotted drug users... so many invisible drug users. There's a market, otherwise they wouldn't produce them".

04:10

Yunnan general views

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04:24

MCDONELL: Yunnan Province is a lush green corner of China. Its remote location has spared it the excesses of development.

04:30

Ruili general views

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04:43

MCDONELL:  Here you can find the bustling border town of Ruili. Part of it has been given special economic zone status to try and boost commerce between China and Myanmar.

04:49

Young Burmese men on street

Here, Burmese workers can be seen in droves looking for work in local factories. Others come to do business. There are plenty of visitors with all the right paperwork, but countless numbers without.

05:03

Border fence tracking shot/People coming through fence

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05:19

MCDONELL:   The border fence in the middle of town is dotted with large holes so we sit across from one of these illegal entry points and watch. Through they come, one after another. Some pause first to check - others just race through. This is only 100 metres from the main official entry point and in broad daylight, they cross and they cross and they cross.

05:22

McDonell approaches border fence

We decide to approach the young men on the Myanmar side of the border for a chat and speak to them through a translator.

06:01

McDonell speaks with Burmese men

"I want to know, have a lot of people come through here lately in order to sell drugs? [men shake head] Aren't any? Aren't any here?"

MEN VIA INTERPRETER: "They're not coming through this actual door".

MCDONELL: "I'm not talking so much about this particular entrance but crossing this border. Could you ask them where along the border?"

06:10

It seems they want to defend the credibility of this particular illegal entrance to China.

06:36

MEN VIA INTERPRETER: "Ah... you have to go 105 yards that way".

MCDONELL: "Another place".

MEN VIA INTERPRETER: "Another place".

06:43

MCDONELL: "How many people do they think would cross the border here every day?"

06:48

MEN VIA INTERPRETER: "There are many. Every day two or three hundred".

MCDONELL: If anything,

06:53

Burmese walk through border fence

a few hundred daily crossings would be an under estimation. Dozens come through in just the short time we're here.

07:02

Drugged men lying around

If drug trafficking is sky rocketing as suspected, then it must hit these border communities first as it winds its way north.

07:13

Night time shots

Music

07:22

MCDONELL: So we go looking for someone who knows the local trade. We meet a young man who's prepared to talk about the drug situation in Ruili on condition of anonymity.

07:24

"Drug usage here... is it becoming more serious?"

07:40

McDonell with Ruili man

RUILI MAN: "The number of drug dealers doesn't seem to change much but there are many more drug users".

MCDONELL: "How many more than before? Twice as many?"

07:45

RUILI MAN: "Right, nearly two times more".

07:56

Night time tracking shots

MCDONELL: He tells us that those using drugs regularly in the town vary from Chinese to Burmese, some are students, some are business people.

07:59

Music

08:11

McDonell with Ruili man

MCDONELL:  "Where are the drugs sold? In a secret place?"

RUILI MAN: "It's not necessarily a secret place - just a place where police don't show up".

08:16

MCDONELL: "So you can see drug dealing on the street?"

RUILI MAN: "Yes, you can".

MCDONELL: "Could you show me where?"

RUILI MAN: "Yes".

08:33

Driving around Ruili

Music

08:41

MCDONELL: He guides us through Ruili, down this town's small vibrant streets to a particular little corner. And soon after we arrive, the customers are turning up.

08:47

People on street waiting for drugs

This man walks across the street to a doorway which will be very busy tonight. He indicates the quantity and in front of a small child, he hands over cash in exchange for drugs. Then he goes off to find somewhere safe to take them.

09:04

Drug transactions

This is a humming part of town and many will go through this doorway. We can't see what's going on inside but there's plenty of movement in the street. A man in green waits outside. Eventually a woman in white emerges and approaches him. Again it's money going one way and drugs the other. She counts his change and then hands it over. As soon as the coast is clear, he walks away.

09:38

Given the ease with which we've spotted these transactions, it's hard to imagine that the local authorities are not fully aware of this situation.

10:16

The man in green likes what he's seen so he comes back for more. These are only small purchases but Chinese police statistics cast them in a much bigger light.

10:28

Drug transactions continue

Music

10:39

MCDONELL:  Nearby, Burmese poppy cultivation was up by 33.8% last year, the equivalent of 60 tons of heroin. In 2012 local Yunnan police seized 9 tons of ice coming out of Myanmar - 26% more than the year before. And the deals keep coming.

10:43

In full public view the drugs are prepared. The preferred method of consumption here is smoking - even for heroin and methamphetamine. Yet, increasingly, in what was once a heroin zone, this is now becoming an ice town.

11:09

PROFESSOR WU JIANG: "Comparatively speaking, it's easier to access. It's easier to buy from the market. It's comparatively cheap.

11:31

Prof Wu Jiang

The consumers are many young people. Among them it can form a kind of culture - a smoking subculture".

11:46

Travelling shots

12:02

MCDONELL: The roads out of Ruili are all heading north and for drugs being smuggled into China, there is a well-trodden path. For most, the first stop is the regional capital where onward distribution will be organised.

"I'm here at the Kunming Narcotics Bureau.

12:07

McDonell outside Kunming Narcotics Bureau

There are more than a 160 police here. Apparently this is the largest drug squad in China and we've been invited here to come and have a chat.

12:25

McDonell meets with Wang Zheng Long

Wang Zheng Long is a young intelligence officer and to give us an idea of how busy they've been, he shows us some of the drugs police have confiscated lately.

12:36

Looking at bags of drugs

"These are real drugs that you've seized. Am I correct?"

WANG ZHENG LONG: "That's correct. They are real.

12:50

This is opium".

MCDONELL: "Opium?

12:58

So people have secretly brought this in from overseas - or produced the drugs in China?"

WANG ZHENG LONG: "No. These drugs are all from overseas. We've seized them in China".

MCDONELL: "So they are from Myanmar?"

13:02

WANG ZHENG LONG: "Right, yes".

MCDONELL: "They've come from Myanmar to be sold in China?"

WANG ZHENG LONG: "Right, right".

13:20

Looking at drugs continues

MCDONELL: We see Ketamine, also known as Special K and a pillow case of morphine. There's heroin cut into blocks for convenient concealment and in smaller pieces to fit into a condom for internal body secretion.

13:27

Chinese police seized 7.3 tons of heroin last year but methamphetamine was double that. In 2012 ice seizures went from 14 to over 16 tons and we're shown large bags of it in various levels of purity.

13:44

"So, if I wanted to sell these here, how much would they be worth?"

WHANG ZHENG LONG: "Sell them all?"

MCDONELL: "Yes".

WHANG ZHENG LONG: "At once?"

14:06

They sell for around 50 Yuan a tablet".

MCDONELL: "50 Yuan for one.

14:13

Ten thousand tablets at ten bucks a pop so I'm holding a hundred thousand dollar's worth of drugs here. It's quite a bit".

14:17

Of course that's the price in Yunnan Province. The further these narcotics are transported from the border, whether it be inside machine parts, hollowed out shoe heels or wooden artefacts, the more profit there is to be made, as the price doubles and triples upon arrival in China's mega cities.

1:23

Night time Shanghai

Music

14:46

MCDONELL: " Shanghai is the gleaming citadel at the heart of China's booming East coast. It's a massive port town, a thriving business centre, a magnet for foreigners and home to some 23 million people. If you were going to build a city to promote the drug trade in China, it'd probably look like Shanghai.

14:54

This metropolis is an affluence factory - to the point where it's mocked by the rest of China for having such a superficial and greedy outlook.

15:26

But, when it comes to drug taking, many analysts think a much more important factor than disposable income is a new found social acceptance of drugs and not only here.

15:39

Young people drug taking

There was a time not so long ago when it was hard to find a young person in China who'd taken illegal drugs. Their friends would have thought they were freaks, but in many circles now, it's seen as a totally normal and acceptable practice.

15:53

Music

16:11

SHANGHAI MALE EX USER: "When I arrived at a friend's home they put several kinds of stuff on the table. They told me, "It's fine to take this - it's different from heroin - you won't get addicted to it"... etcetera. So I started taking it".

16:19

MCDONELL: "What kind of drugs were they?"

16:37

SHANGHAI MALE EX USER: "It was ice".

16:40

Night time Shanghai

Music

16:44

Woman walking down street

MCDONELL: We meet a Shanghai woman who, at one time, got into methamphetamine. And why not? The feelings were great, she was with her friends and having the time of her life.

16:50

Night time Shanghai

Music

17:00

SHANGHAI WOMAN EX USER: "We thought it was fun and fashionable to take drugs - so we wanted to keep up with the trend.

17:06

Woman in silhouette

Most of all, we didn't see the harm in it. We thought it was different from heroin and we wouldn't get addicted. So I took it again and again".

17:17

Young people out on town

Music

17:33

MCDONELL: It's Friday night in Shanghai so naturally the kids are heading out to play.

17:41

Music

17:45

MCDONELL:  It was probably inevitable that as China opened up to all things foreign, illegal drugs would eventually spread through cities like this in larger numbers.

17:50

Music

17:59

MCDONELL: And as this is a country that doesn't know how to do things in half measures, when you're into it, you're into it!

18:06

Young people at night club

Music

18:14

MCDONELL:  What's more, Chinese people are early adaptors. According to police research the new trend is to order drugs over the internet. Some dealers even use official fast couriers to make a drop.

18:26

Music

18:39

McDonell at night club to camera

MCDONELL: "Compared to Sydney, London or New York, the level of drug use in places like this is still pretty small. The important thing is the trajectory and it's only going in one direction - up".

18:48

Dance floor of club

Music

19:03

MCDONELL: And according to some experts, while economic growth may have fanned Chinese drug use, a really big expansion might be in the wings if the economy actually falters.

PROFESSOR WU JIANG: "If China keeps up a normal, stable level of economic growth strengthening drug control systems and education, drug use will not expand so widely.

19:11

Music

19:39

Night club interior

PROFESSOR WU JIANG:  "But if our growth halts with bad social management, and we have social instability, then the drug problem in China will dramatically increase. It could be ten times or twenty times bigger."

19:43

Music

19:58

MCDONELL: That's not just because some might turn to drugs when times are tough to dull the pain. It's also because people might see the narcotics trade as a potential replacement for lost business opportunities in other areas.

20:00

Music

20:13

Prof Wu Jiang. Super:
Professor Wu Jiang
Yunnan University

PROFESSOR WU JIANG: "It just brings in so much profit. If someone wanted to break into our system, it is very easy. The easiest and the quickest way to make a fortune is to deal drugs - to sell drugs here.

20:23

Drugged woman

Music

20:39

Ex user walking

MCDONELL: Yet, as with all highs, there's the comedown. Our woman hit rock bottom when her son, who was once a good student, was nearly thrown out of school. She was picked up by police and sent to rehab.

20:45

Woman ex user on bridge looking at cars

These days she's clean, has a new job and her son has made it into university. Yet the old times still linger in her memory.

21:05

SHANGHAI WOMAN EX USER: "My life is great. My family, myself, my career and my parents are all great. I am back to how I felt before I had taken drugs. But deep in my heart there's a small place reminding me that I took drugs before".

21:15

Music

21:40

Ex users working on production lines

MCDONELL: For many in China, trying to kick it is not only tough but it's compulsory and while ice may be on the rise, a much more traditional drug casts a long shadow here.

21:48

Music

22:07

MCDONELL: There are one thousand ex-heroin addicts working at the Yulu complex. Work camp style rehabilitation centres like this one in Yunnan's Kaiyuan City were set up in the 1990s for drug users who'd been picked up by the authorities and today there are 678 of them across China housing 300,000 ex drug users.

22:09

Music

22:39

MCDONELL: But now the police who run Yulu say people choose to come and choose to stay, but when they're here, the rules are strict.

22:44

McDonell to camera at Yulu

"Normally if a foreign camera crew came into a Chinese factory there'd be smiles and giggling and ‘Oooh, what are they doing in here?' Not in this place, listen... Nothing... Just the sound of the machines. People are head down, working. I don't know if it's because they're sad or embarrassed about their past but it's definitely the way it is".

22:59

Lu Jianghuai in factory

Lu Jianghuai says it was only possible for him to give up heroin because of the discipline here. Now he's been promoted to manage this

23:26

McDonell with Lu in factory

floor of the factory complex.

[looking at production on factory floor] "What about over here"?

LU JIANGHUAI: "From there and there they glue them and over there we sew them together.

MCDONELL: "Ah... put them together".

23:33

Woman sewing/Factories

MCDONELL: "He introduces the work they do with 15 companies investing in a network of factories making everything from purses to solar water heaters, door frames to cigarette lighters.

23:50

McDonell with Lu in factory

I asked him what's become of the friends he used to take heroin with.

24:03

LU JIANGHUAI: "Most of them are dead following an overdose".

24:07

Lu in factory

Music

24:12

MCDONELL: Lu Jianghuai has found a woman to marry him at the factory but as for those who were once closest to him, well he doesn't see them very much.

24:17

LU JIANGHUAI: "Dad and Mum got divorced because of my addiction.

24:31

Music

24:35

Lu

LU JIANGHUAI:  Because I was taking drugs they scolded me but I couldn't stop. My family started to... ah... what can I say? I feel very sorry for what happened to my family".

24:41

Men working in rehabilitation complex

Music

25:07

MCDONELL: This rehabilitation complex is rolling out a massive attempt at healing in response to an industrial sized problem in China. Yet, if you think this is of concern, well it could even hit you closer to home.

25:17

Drug squad room.  Police around table

DRUG SQUAD ROOM: "Attention! Dress Right!"

25:40

MCDONELL: It's morning meeting for the drug squad at Qing Long Chang.

LIEUTENANT: "Eyes front! Sit down!"

25:45

Lieutenant Li addresses officers

MCDONELL: Here Lieutenant Li Liuhua runs a 24-hour station where 70 officers rotate on three shifts. This is the front line in China's war on drugs flowing in from neighbouring Myanmar and we've been given rare access to see their operation.

25:57

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: [addressing Drug Squad] "This path is the major one for drugs coming in. But they will probably take the neighbouring roads".

26:22

Lieutenant Li draws route on blackboard

MCDONELL: The squad operates a checkpoint near the border to filter drug traffic. Lieutenant Li shows how the main routes from Myanmar converge on that position, yet how more recently, the smart drug runners have been getting around them via more isolated paths.

26:34

Last year these officers played their part in the interception of 9 tons of Burmese ice coming into the country. They're taking on some major business interests.

26:55

COMMISSIONER JIANG MINGDONG: "Drug crime is high-profit, serious crime..

27:07

Commission Jiang. Super:
Jiang Mingdong
Narcotics Control Bureau

Driven by profit and defending their interests, criminal syndicates will take desperate risks - it's a struggle of life and death."

27:13

Yunnan scenery

Music

27:28

MCDONELL: Yunnan is a place that dreams are made of.

27:39

Music

27:43

MCDONELL:  With its lush forests, mountains, rivers and remote ethnic groups, it's the China of paintings and poems right there in front of you.

27:47

McDonell in car/scenery

Music

27:56

MCDONELL:  Yet there's a side to this province not spoken of in the tourist brochures. It's the staging post for a major narcotics trade flowing in to meet Chinese demand and lucrative markets beyond.

28:06

Music

28:19

MCDONELL:  We're on our way to the thin line between the drug runners and the rest of the world.

28:21

Music

28:26

McDonell in car to camera

MCDONELL:  "Well, we're driving through what has to be one of the most beautiful parts of China and searching for drugs. We're here with the Yunnan Provincial Drug Squad. Mr Xue, he's showing us around and I'll just have a bit of a word to him.

"Mr Xue do you think that recently it's been harder or easier for you to apprehend people smuggling drugs?"

MR XUE: "There have been a lot of cases and it's not easy".

MCDONELL: "Not easy? Why?"

28:32

MR XUE: "With drugs coming in from overseas, it's impossible to stop them all.

29:04

There are a lot of paths. Our police forces don't have enough manpower - we just don't have enough people".

29:09

View of highway from car/McDonell in car

MCDONELL: The Chinese police are patrolling a four thousand kilometre border region here and they know they're battling to keep it under control.

29:18

Arriving at Qing Long Chang

We arrive at Qing Long Chang to speak to them about the monumental task they've been given of trying to hold back the tide.

29:32

McDonell greets officer

This has become a very busy unit indeed and we're about to see why.

29:43

Here Lieutenant Li Liuhua tells us that they can go for weeks without a bust, yet sometimes will catch multiple drug runners in quick succession.

29:59

Officers stop and search vehicles

China may be known for its media control but he says we can film whatever happens while we're here. And straight away they're into it.

30:14

Music

30:23

MCDONELL: No nook or cranny is beyond suspicion. No bag of vegetables to be left unstabbed. No delivery too urgent to be delayed and no family enterprise is beyond being questioned.

30:29

Officer questions man in car

POLICE OFFICER: "How often do you transport goods?"

MAN IN CAR: "If business is good, probably once a day. If not, probably every three or five days".

30:46

Music

30:52

COMMISSIONER JIANG MINGDONG (Narcotics Control Bureau): "We feel this is getting more and more severe.

30:57

Commissioner Jiang

There are more and more drugs being processed both inside and outside of China. There is more and more demand so of course there will be more and more smuggled drugs. So this really is becoming a serious problem".

31:02

Officers stop black Audi

Music

31:17

MCDONELL: A black Audi pulls up and it draws immediate attention. One officer is responsible for picking suspicious vehicles and this one has been identified as such. It's not the type of car so much as who's driving it.

31:23

<ale driver of Audi argues with police

Girls in frilly dresses move through pretty quickly. Young men in groups are prime suspects. They also don't mind letting the police know what an inconvenience it is. This is not going to go smoothly.

31:39

Police frisk driver

The police say drug-related criminal cases in China were up by 20% last year. According to their records, this involved 133,000 arrests.

32:01

Officer looks at car engine

Critics of China's legal system would question not only the voracity of these statistics but the procedural fairness of police work here. Yet a substantial increase in Chinese drug crime is also corroborated by international sources.

32:17

Lieutenant to driver

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "You wait here! You wait here!"

32:36

MALE DRIVER OF AUDI: "I'm going to get some water".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "We're checking now, why don't you cooperate?"

MALE DRIVER OF AUDI: "Ok. Ok. After you check our vehicle, can we go then?"

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "We check you in accordance with the law and you don't run around. You should just rest here. Sit down".

32:42

Officer hands driver water/Officer searches car. Finds cigarettes

MCDONELL: The water finally comes and tempers cool a little, but the search of their car uncovers a secret compartment under the boot. It's rammed with cartons of cigarettes. These will all have to be checked. It also means their car is now up for a thorough examination.

32:52

Music

33:13

Bus at border. Bus passengers searched

MCDONELL:  In the meantime, a long distance bus has arrived from the border and again it's the young men who are asked to get off first to be scrutinised. Bags are searched and questions asked. In many parts of the world, even elsewhere in China, it'd be seen as rather excessive for police to drag passengers off a bus and frisk them in this way simply because they're travelling in a certain direction. But in Yunnan's drug belt, it's becoming standard procedure.

33:23

Officer searches young man

One young man comes off the bus and he's not like the others. He appears edgy, even as small items are taken out of his pocket - and as he's frisked from head to toe.

34:05

This man is scared. He joins the line of fellow passengers who've been chosen for a scan in the x-ray truck. He looks around and won't meet the direct gaze of anyone, least of all our camera.

34:21

Young man into x-ray van

After all the others have been checked, it's his turn.

34:36

Officer pointing at x-ray

POLICE IN X-RAY VAN: "One, two, three pieces".

34:49

MCDONELL: It seems they've spotted something on the x-ray.

34:53

POLICE IN X-RAY VAN: "Here is a bag. All together there are three bags. It looks like ice.

SECOND OFFICER:  Yeah, it's pretty obvious. He's inserted three bags at once".

34:56

Young man waits at x-ray van

MCDONELL: What they've found inside this man are three packets of methamphetamine, known on the streets as ice.

35:13

Inside x-ray van

POLICE IN X-RAY VAN: "There is nothing in his stomach. They are around his anus.  Get out of the van!"

MCDONELL: This travelling man is now in serious trouble and he's having the situation spelt out to him

35:21

Lieutenant Li with young man

pretty plainly.

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "Now, you shouldn't lie to me. We can see from the X-ray machine, you're carrying them inside your arse. You should be honest with us - we'll give you this chance, okay? You tell us right now. We have already seen it from the equipment, you can't run away. You don't need to be nervous, tell me the truth, okay?"

35:36

Male bus passenger listens

MCDONELL: His fellow travellers are still not back on the bus and within earshot of the conversation.

35:56

Officer tapes young man's jeans/McDonell to camera

"The reason they've put this tape around him is because you know if the drugs come out they don't want them to fall out of the bottom of his jeans there.

36:05

Lieutenant questions young man

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "Once you brought the drugs across, how were they going to contact you? ... How were they going to contact you?

YOUNG CHINESE MAN: "I don't know".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "You don't know? Let me tell you - stop telling lies to me. You should cooperate with us immediately to reduce the punishment. After all, you've only transported these drugs for other people - they don't belong to you".

36:12

MCDONELL: The young man slowly begins to realise that his fate has been sealed and starts to open up, telling him that he made this run for the equivalent of five hundred dollars.

36:38

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "For such a small amount of money, you carried them? This is a crime. Drug trafficking is a crime. To transport drugs is a crime - do you know that? Do you know that?

YOUNG CHINESE MAN: "I didn't know they were drugs".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "What?"

YOUNG CHINESE MAN: "I didn't know they were drugs".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "You didn't know they were drugs? So why did you insert them inside you? Why?

MCDONELL: "The police have been asking him

36:51

McDonell to camera

how much did you pay for the drugs?... What time did you insert them?... What's your final destination?... Who are the people? ... Obviously they're trying to do a bit of a deal with him, saying if you give up the people who've gotten you to bring these drugs up here then we'll be more lenient on you".

37:16

YOUNG CHINESE MAN: "I needed to be in Kunming first".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "Right so you needed to be in Kunming and they would contact you from here.

37:31

Officers handcuff young man and lead him in to van

All right - handcuff him".

37:41

MCDONELL: Most of the drug mules they're catching are hardly big time criminals and the police know it.

COMMISSIONER JIANG MINGDONG (Narcotics Control Bureau): "For these people they are very poor.

37:58

Commissioner Jiang. Super:
Jiang Mingdong
Narcotics Control Bureau

The economy in their areas is not good. More importantly, they are poorly educated. They don't know about the law. They're just pawns of the criminal groups".

38:16

Police shift change. Night time

Music

38:37

MCDONELL: With nightfall a new shift marches into place. The checking, searching and questioning rolls on relentlessly. But as thorough and as persistent as they are, they'll never get it all.

38:40

McDonell with Lieutenant Li

[to Lieutenant Li Liuhua] "The drugs they're carrying are where? Mostly. Inside their bodies? Inside cars? Where?"

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "Most of them are hidden in the "sandwich layers" of cars. For example, this part, you could have a "sandwich layer". You can only see it from underneath. In big trucks, they could be hidden in goods and in "sandwich layers". Not as much inside human bodies. You can stuff it in, but not much quantity".

38:59

Commissioner Jiang in office

MCDONELL: Commissioner Jiang Mingdong has been a drug squad police officer in Yunnan for 30 years. He's proud of how many drugs they've seized during his career.

39:29

Commissioner Jiang

COMMISSIONER JIANG MINGDONG: "The amount is huge - more than 200 tons! Can you imagine if we'd let those 200 tons float inland or into the international community how much damage it could've caused?"

39:41

Stills. Burning of confiscated drugs

Music

39:52

MCDONELL: Police here stage mass burns of confiscated drugs. It's a public relations exercise to send a message that they're not a light touch. Many hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of drugs go up in flames but the syndicates know it's nothing, compared to the profits to be made if they can transport these goods to lands far away, to places like Australia.

39:58

Just take the Australian Federal Police's figures for this year's intercepts coming into Australia from China.

40:33

GFX over city.
January, Perth, methamphetamine 35 kilograms

January, Perth, methamphetamine 35 kilograms.

40:40

June, Sydney, methamphetamine, 57 kilograms/$42 million

June, Sydney, methamphetamine, 57 kilograms, street value $42 million.

40:45

May, Sydney liquid methamphetamine, 72 litres

May, Sydney liquid methamphetamine, 72 litres.

40:53

February, Sydney pure methamphetamine, 13 kilograms

February, Sydney pure methamphetamine, 13 kilograms.

40:58

February, Sydney, methamphetamine, 585 kilograms/ $438 million

February, Sydney, methamphetamine, 585 kilograms, street value $438 million.

41:03

This last case was the largest ice seizure ever seen in Australia.

COMMANDER RAY JOHNSON (Former Beijing Liaison Officer): "There's Chinese

41:20

Commander Johnson. Super:
Commander Ray Johnson
Fmr Beijing Liaison Officer

organised crime working in Australia, but equally they're working with Australian nationals, organised criminals".

41:27

Johnson walks

MCDONELL: Commander Ray Johnson worked out of the Australian Federal Police Beijing station for three years. COMMANDER RAY JOHNSON: "I think it's fair to say that the drug problem in China is growing.

41:35

Commander Johnson

Yes, China is a source country for the supply of an amount of drugs to Australia".

41:48

Photos. Drugs

MCDONELL: Chinese drugs are being smuggled into Australia in garden hoses, bags of cleaning chemicals, ceramic tiles and shampoo bottles.

41:55

AFP Drug busts

For methamphetamine precursor chemicals coming into Australia the major source is now China. For ecstasy precursor chemicals coming into Australia the major source by quantity is China. We know this because Chinese and Australian police are conducting joint operations. At times they deliberately let the drugs go through in order to catch everyone involved.

42:05

COMMANDER RAY JOHNSON: "We might discover the export from China and

42:30

Commander Johnson. Super:
Commander Ray Johnson
Fmr Beijing Liaison Officer

in cooperation with our Chinse partners we could substitute with an inert substance and allow the export to become an import into Australia and then, all the while, investigate the syndicate that surrounds that import".

42:33

Port Botany

MCDONELL: When a series of container ships arrived at Port Botany two years ago, it marked the beginning of a major China-Australia campaign to stem the flow of drugs between the two countries. Hidden in these shipments were more than 2,800 litres of the precursor chemical safrole oil, enough to make millions of ecstasy tablets.

42:48

AFP Drug bust

And according to the AFP with a street value of around $500 million. In what was known as Operation Hitch, the materials were seized, arrests made and police say it led to the dismantling of an alleged trans-national drug importation syndicate.

COMMANDER RAY JOHNSON: "That operation resulted in the arrest of three people in Australia

43:17

Commander Johnson

and it ultimately led to the arrest of twenty three people in China and the seizure of a further 500 litres".

43:43

Chinese police drill

43:48

MCDONELL: Now we're told barely a week goes by when criminal intelligence is not being shared between China and Australia, allowing Chinese police to make arrests as well. Our drug squad has even written a song trumpeting the team's success.

43:55

Drug squad sing

DRUG SQUAD, (SINGING): "The green mountains accompany me. The stars love us. Day and night we persist and uphold our work lines on the national roads. Though the vehicles stream like a river, we will not let any ferocious drug criminals get through. No matter how cunning those drug traffickers are and how they try to cover themselves our penetrating eyes can see through them".

44:15

MCDONELL: Qinglong Chang Drug Squad believes it has heroin basically under control, at least it's stable, but methamphetamine is another matter.

44:45

Chinese police drill

In 2005 around 8% of drug busts in China involved ice. Now they're nudging 40%. It's an exploding market and it's where these police are concentrating much of their energy.

44:54

SINGING: "Loyal to the people! Dedicated to our duties! Loyal to the people! Dedicated to our duties!"

45:09

Police stopping bus and checking passengers

Music

45:22

MCDONELL: On board the long-distance sleeping buses the checking is going ahead in full swing. Bags are searched and documents examined with plenty of questions. A tap on the shoulder from a colleague... they've found something.

45:30

Police question woman

POLICE OFFICER: "Where are you going?"

WOMAN: "To Kunming".

POLICE OFFICER: "What are you going to do there?"

WOMAN: "My boss asks me to go there".

45:46

MCDONELL: This woman is asked to produce her ID but doesn't have one. She's a Burmese citizen. A woman travelling with a small child clearly doesn't fit the profile of those the police have been homing in on. And yet she is carrying methamphetamine.

45:57

McDonell on bus to camera

"You can see here somebody else has been caught carrying drugs. They've come in from Burma and they're hiding the drugs inside some sort of... again it looks like a condom or something like that, they've been hiding them underneath the mattress of this bus.

46:21

Police examine drugs

The police are now asking them where they got this from and just the details of where they intended to take them".

46:42

Police question woman

POLICE OFFICER: "Whose child is this?"

WOMAN: "He's mine".

POLICE OFFICER: "How old?"

WOMAN: "One to two years".

46:47

POLICE OFFICER: "Do you have any more?"

WOMAN: "Nothing else".

46:52

Woman and child get off bus

MCDONELL:  The woman and child are taken off the bus. She'll be questioned, but either way, normally in China, any run in with the law means you're going down.

47-:02

Woman holds drugs and show McDonell

"Can we have a look?"

She shows us the three packets of ice she was attempting to deliver to the regional capital. This seems to be the standard amount that poor couriers are asked to take.

"We're actually going to try and ask her a couple of questions

47:13

to get translated through the local police here".

[in Chinese] "Can you ask her why she did it? Is it because of money, or why? Did somebody make her do it?

47:30

[Interchange in Burmese between police officer and woman]

47:41

[Stephen interprets] "Money, money".

47:48

MCDONELL: "So a friend has gotten her to do this. Obviously they're poor people and someone's given them 5,000 yuan to bring these drugs across the border".

POLICE OFFICER: "Five thousand, did you get it in the hand?"

WOMAN: "Not yet. When I deliver it there, I get paid".

47:55

Police officer holds child

MCDONELL:  That's around 900 Australian dollars.

48:14

McDonell with woman and police officer

"I'm just trying to establish if lots of people from their village actually bring drugs across the border. It seems they do". [in Chinese] "Has she done this before?"

[Interchange in Burmese between police officer and woman]

48:17

[Stephen translates] "So she's done this before herself... So she's successfully brought drugs across the border before and this is the second time she's done it."

The police say that pregnant women or women with small children are favoured to act as drug couriers.

48:32

Police officer holds child

It's not only because they look less suspicious.

48:52

Woman walks with officers

This woman tells the police that she is still breastfeeding her child. Under the Chinse system that means she won't be sent to gaol - at least for the moment. We're later told that she's to be sent back to Myanmar until her child is of a certain age, then apparently the Burmese police will hand her back over to China to face trial here.

48:57

Officer with Audi driver

As for our young men pulled over earlier by the police, they were also carrying a sword and a large knife in their car, but no drugs.

49:31

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "Our duty is to check for the drugs but you're carrying controlled knives. It's not necessary to arrest you - you haven't hurt anyone. We're just confiscating them".

MALE DRIVER OF AUDI: "They were given by my friends as gifts".

LIEUTENANT LI LIUHUA: "We can't return them to you. Those are the controlled knives".

MALE DRIVER OF AUDI: "If you're really not giving them back we will go then".

49:45

Audi drives away

MCDONELL: And with that, they're allowed to go.

50:09

Officers escort young man to cell

Yet this man's life has come to a devastating cross roads before our eyes. He is looking at a minimum of 10 to 15 years in gaol.

As China's drug trade flourishes, there are many like him running the gauntlet here, poor people taking the quick money so others can reap the profits - and try though the police might to plug the holes, in their hearts they know that the tide is well and truly coming in.

50:21

Credits

Reporter: Stephen McDonell
Camera: Wayne McAllister
Editor: Nicholas Brenner
Producers: Charles Li / Zhang Qian

51:05