From: lessgovt@gmail.com   
      
   U.S. Charges 4 Chinese Firms With Selling Chemicals to Make Fentanyl   
   By Benjamin Weiser and Karen Zraick, June 23, 2023, NY Times   
   Four chemical companies based in China and eight Chinese nationals have been   
   charged with trafficking chemicals used by Mexican drug cartels to manufacture   
   vast quantities of fentanyl later sold in the United States, federal officials   
   said on Friday.   
      
   The officials said that two of the defendants, the principal executive of one   
   Chinese firm and its marketing manager, had been arrested overseas and taken   
   to Hawaii for a court appearance, and that they would be brought to Manhattan   
   to face prosecution.   
      
   The indictments announced Friday in New York are part of a strategy by the   
   Drug Enforcement Administration to attack the scourge of fentanyl at every   
   stage of the supply chain. The buyers of the chemicals were largely   
   organizations like the Sinaloa    
   cartel, formerly run by the Mexican drug lord known as El Chapo, which the   
   Justice Dept says is largely responsible for the influx of fentanyl into the   
   United States.   
      
   Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said in a news conference that the firms   
   advertised the so-called precursor chemicals online, and an indictment said   
   they were packaged to resemble dog food, nuts or motor oil. Wuhan-based Hubei   
   Amarvel Biotech Co., Mr.   
    Garland added, “went as far as to guarantee ‘100% stealth shipping,’   
   and they provided proof of their success on their websites, including a   
   screenshot of a shipping confirmation to Culiacán, Mexico, the Sinaloa   
   cartel’s base of operations.”   
      
   Anne Milgram, the administrator of the D.E.A., said the companies also   
   chemically camouflaged their goods in the lab.   
      
   “They even disguised the chemicals at a molecular level, adding a molecule   
   to mask the precursors so they would not be detected as banned substances   
   during transport,” Ms. Milgram said. “They taught their customers how to   
   remove that molecule after    
   they received the chemicals.”   
      
   Damian Williams, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, said   
   at the news conference that over the course of the investigation, Amarvel   
   Biotech shipped more than 200 kilograms of precursor chemicals to the United   
   States, which for that    
   company “was apparently only a drop in the bucket,” Mr. Williams added.   
      
   The two Chinese executives taken into custody, Qingzhou Wang and Yiyi Chen,   
   worked for Amarvel Biotech, Mr. Williams’s office said. A lawyer for   
   Qingzhou Wang did not immediately respond to a request for comment; one for   
   Ms. Chen declined. A third    
   employee was also charged and is at large.   
      
   Three other Chinese companies along with five employees were named in   
   indictments unsealed on Friday in Brooklyn federal court.   
      
   Breon S. Peace, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, noted   
   at the news conference that although most of the chemicals the companies sold   
   were legal, the defendants knew they would be used to make fentanyl. “This   
   is akin to a company    
   selling the components for a bomb, knowing they would be used to make an   
   explosive,” Mr. Peace said.   
      
   Ms. Milgram called fentanyl “the greatest threat to Americans today,”   
   adding that fentanyl overdoses are the leading cause of death for people   
   between 18 and 45. The drug can be 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times   
   stronger than morphine, and    
   is sometimes added to cocaine or heroin without the buyer’s knowledge.   
      
   In New York City, overdoses have skyrocketed thanks to fentanyl, with 2,668   
   deaths in 2021, a 78 percent jump from 2019, according to city data.   
      
   Ms. Milgram said the Chinese firms gave their customers the raw materials and   
   the scientific know-how to make the drug — “and they knew exactly who they   
   were working with.”   
      
   “They provided the chemicals,” she said. “They gave advice on how to mix   
   them. They made changes to the recipe when an ingredient wasn’t available.   
   They told a customer to substitute one ingredient for another to make twice as   
   much fentanyl. They    
   employed chemists to troubleshoot when customers had questions.”   
      
   The charges revealed Friday came two months after Mr. Garland announced   
   sweeping indictments in Manhattan, Chicago and Washington, D.C., against more   
   than two dozen people in what he described as a global fentanyl manufacturing   
   and distribution operation    
   run by the Sinaloa cartel.   
      
   Those defendants included the four sons of El Chapo, whose real name is   
   Joaquín Guzmán Loera and who is serving life in prison in the United States   
   after his 2019 conviction in Brooklyn.   
      
   The D.E.A. has also pursued dealers across the United States who sell fentanyl   
   on the streets. Last month, the agency announced the completion of Operation   
   Last Mile, a yearlong effort to stop dealers that resulted in more than 3,300   
   arrests and the    
   seizure of nearly 44 million fentanyl pills and more than 6,500 pounds of   
   powder.   
      
   The trade was also a major topic this week during a visit to Beijing by   
   Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. The United States and China have been at   
   loggerheads over military and technological policies, the Russia-Ukraine war   
   and human rights, but Mr.    
   Blinken said that he raised fentanyl control as an area of potential   
   cooperation. Mr. Blinken said that the countries would explore setting up a   
   working group to “shut off the flow” of precursor chemicals.   
      
   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/23/nyregion/china-fentanyl-compa   
   ies-charged.html   
      
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