By AFP and Entorno | 2024-12-04

BEIJING -- Washington has long accused Beijing of ignoring the deadly fentanyl trade, which US authorities estimate caused more than 70,000 overdose deaths last year.

The United States is facing an epidemic of deaths caused by fentanyl, a synthetic opioid 50 times more powerful than heroin and much easier and cheaper to produce.

It is now the leading cause of death among Americans aged 18 to 45, US officials have said.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration has said China is "the main source for all fentanyl-related substances trafficked into the United States."

And while the Congressional Research Service acknowledged this year that direct supplies of the drug from China had been stemmed by stricter controls from Beijing in 2019, it said the move had shifted the supply lines.

Instead of the drugs being supplied directly via international courier services, it said, chemical components are instead shipped from China to Mexico, where they are then made into fentanyl and smuggled across the border.

Many of those components are legal in China and have legitimate medical use as painkillers, making prosecution tricky.

In October 2023, the United States slapped sanctions on more than two dozen China-based entities and individuals alleged to be the "source of supply" for many US-based narcotics traffickers, dark web vendors, virtual currency money launderers and Mexican cartels.

The group, which included a Wuhan-based company and several other firms based in Hong Kong and the mainland, was alleged to be responsible for the shipment of approximately 900kg of "seized fentanyl and methamphetamine precursors" to the United States and Mexico.

"The global fentanyl supply chain, which ends with the deaths of Americans, often starts with chemical companies in China," US Attorney General Merrick Garland said then.

This summer, a counter-narcotics working group convened in Washington and China announced it would step up its regulation of three key fentanyl precursors.

But it remains to be seen whether the latest curbs will fully stop the cross-border traffickers, whom the Justice Department said "adapt to tightening restrictions."

Manufacturers can develop new variants of the synthetic precursors faster than they can be identified and added to scheduled lists of substances controlled by Chinese authorities, say analysts.

Beijing needs to take a tougher line against domestic firms involved in the trade, said Vanda Felbab-Brown, an specialist on organized crime at the Brookings Institution.

Compounding the problem are expansive money laundering networks that underpin the trade, which analysts say requires closer coordination between Washington and Beijing to curb.

"International drug cartels are increasingly turning to specialized Chinese criminal gangs for swift, cheap and secure money laundering services," wrote Zongyuan Zoe Liu in a September report for the Council on Foreign Relations.

"Obtaining support from Beijing to stop the flow of illicit fentanyl and its precursor chemicals is an important first step in addressing the supply problem," Liu wrote.