China Seized Large Amount of Drugs Last Year

China's border defense departments seized 17 tons of heroin, ice and hemp in 1,200 drug trafficking cases last year, arresting 1,933 suspects, a national meeting revealed March 23.

The border defense department of southwest China cracked 669 drug cases, eight of which involved more than 10 kilograms of drugs each, according to a national meeting on fighting narcotics trafficking, which closed here today.

In the coastal areas of southeast China, drug traffickers often use international freighters to transport drugs. In 1999, coastal departments of border defense and public security seized 527 kilograms of "ice".

Statistics from the meeting showed that the number of registered drug users in China had increased to 680,000 last year, up 14.3 percent over the previous year.

By the end of 1999, there were more than 17,000 HIV/AIDS patients in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, and 72 percent of them caught the disease through drug injections.

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