The fight against narcotics is once again on the Sino-American table. Tuesday January 30, a bilateral discussion group between China and the United States met in Beijing to discuss the fight against “synthetic drugs” which “kill thousands of people” per year, said on site Deputy Homeland Security Advisor Jen Daskal.
At the head of the American delegation received at the Diaoyutai complex in Beijing, the official representative defended the position of the American government: that the Chinese government strengthens its fight against companies illegally exporting synthetic drug compounds, including fentanyl.
This synthetic opioid, initially used as a sedative in the medical field, has become in recent years in the United States a recreational drug, 50 times stronger than heroin. As a result, the number of fatal overdoses linked to this product has exploded in the country over the past 20 years, going from 960 annual deaths in 2001 to more than 70,600 in 2021according to the US Federal Agency for Disease Control and Prevention.
Discussions between the two countries have stalled in recent years, with China accusing the United States of being itself responsible for this crisis through its laxity in the fight against drugs. However, the situation improved after a meeting between the American presidents, Joe Biden, and Chinese presidents, Xi Jinping, in November 2023.
Since then, China has multiplied signs of goodwill, according to statements by an anonymous senior American official last week reported by AFP. The country, according to this source, closed one of the companies concerned, blocked certain international payments and resumed the exchange of information with the United States on drug deliveries and trafficking.