The Biden administration called on China to do more to combat the spread of illicit synthetic drugs, weeks after Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Beijing and pressed leaders to help confront the fentanyl crisis.
(Bloomberg) — The Biden administration called on China to do more to combat the spread of illicit synthetic drugs, weeks after Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Beijing and pressed leaders to help confront the fentanyl crisis.
China “needs to do more as a global partner to disrupt illicit synthetic-drug supply chains,” Todd Robinson, the assistant secretary of state for international narcotics and law enforcement, told reporters Thursday. He said the US has no sign yet that China plans to join a new US-led coalition of 84 countries that will work to disrupt the spread of fentanyl and other drugs.
The coalition is set to have its first meeting on Friday. Robinson said the US hoped that getting other countries on board could help persuade Beijing to act.
“Just because the PRC is not talking to the United States, they are talking to other countries,” Robinson said referring to China by its official name, the People’s Republic of China. “This is a global problem that’s going to require a global response, and we think having other countries engage with the PRC will eventually bear fruit.”
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said Friday at a regular press briefing in Beijing that his nation “takes an active part in international counternarcotics cooperation.”
China “firmly opposes smearing and attacking other countries,” he said.
When Blinken visited Beijing in June, he said that he made clear the US wanted more cooperation from China to address the issue. He said the leaders he met with only agreed to “explore setting up a working group or joint effort” to tackle fentanyl.
Private Chinese firms export many of the chemicals used in creating fentanyl — which is roughly 50 times stronger than heroin, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — before it’s trafficked into the US and other countries.
–With assistance from Philip Glamann.
(Updates with response from China’s Foreign Ministry.)
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