(Yahoo! News) Tom Allard October 14 2019 BANGKOK - He is Asias most-wanted man. He is protected by a guard of Thai kickboxers. He flies by private jet. And police say he once lost $66 million in a single night at a Macau casino. Tse Chi Lop a Canadian national born in China is suspected of leading a vast multinational drug trafficking syndicate formed out of an alliance of five of Asias triad groups according to law enforcement officials. Its members call it simply The Company." Police in a nod to one of Tses nicknames have dubbed it Sam Gor Cantonese for Brother Number Three." The syndicate law enforcers believe is funneling tons of methamphetamine heroin and ketamine to at least a dozen countries from Japan in North Asia to New Zealand in the South Pacific. But meth a highly addictive drug with devastating physical and mental effects on long-term users is its main business they say. In what it calls a conservative estimate the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) puts the Sam Gor syndicates meth revenue in 2018 at $8 billion a year but says it could be as high as $17.7 billion. The UN agency estimates that the cartel which often conceals its drugs in packets of tea has a 40 to 70 share of the wholesale regional meth market that has expanded at least fourfold in the past five years. This unprecedented boom in meth production has triggered an unprecedented response. Tse 55 is the prime target of Operation Kungur a sprawling previously unreported counter-narcotics investigation. Led by the Australian Federal Police (AFP) Operation Kungur involves about 20 agencies from Asia North America and Europe. It is by far the biggest ever international effort to combat Asian drug trafficking syndicates say law enforcement agents involved in the investigation. It encompasses authorities from Myanmar China Thailand Japan the United States and Canada. Taiwan while not formally part of the operation is assisting in the investigation. A document containing AFP profiles of the operations top 19 syndicate targets reviewed by Reuters identifies Tse as the leader of the syndicate. According to the document the organization has been connected with or directly involved in at least 13 cases" of drug trafficking since January 2015. The document does not provide specific details of the cases.
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