Among their most recent successes were the arrest of two foreign nationals and the seizure of 4,512 grams of cocaine by customs at Baiyun Airport, Guangzhou in South China's Guangdong Province.

The drugs were found on March 25 during a search of a Filipino woman's baggage. She was traveling from Brazil via Hong Kong.

Questioned by officers, she confessed she was due to rendezvous with her buyer, a Nigerian woman at a hotel. Acting on that information drugs squad officers swooped on the hotel and arrested the Nigerian.

In recent months Guangzhou customs have made three drug seizures, all involving traffickers smuggling drugs in their luggage. A Thai woman was among those arrested.

A major seizure of heroin was made by police in Southwest China's Yunnan Province on April 4.

Police at the Yunnan Dehong frontier inspection station discovered 63 kilograms of heroin hidden in a truck load of rubbers being transported from Yunnan to Guangdong.

Meanwhile, in East China's Jiangxi Province, local police also notched up some successes during joint operations with their Guangdong counterparts.

Officers from the two provinces last month smashed a drug trafficking network, arrested 11 suspects, seized 640 grams of heroin and recovered 100,000 yuan (US$12,000) intended for the purchase of narcotics.

Although details of that operation are sketchy, Jiangxi police did reveal that several people from their province had traveled to Guangdong. But officers were watching and moved in as cash and drugs were exchanged.

(China Daily April 10, 2003)