Juno News - February 14, 2024


China's deadly drug war on Canada


Episode Stats

Length

21 minutes

Words per Minute

159.83965

Word Count

3,482

Sentence Count

197

Hate Speech Sentences

16


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 In 2023, the British Columbia government recorded a staggering 2,511 deaths to toxic drug overdoses,
00:00:14.940 the highest annual death toll ever recorded. Every day, an average of 22 Canadians die to
00:00:21.020 an opioid overdose. Men make up close to 80% of those deaths. In British Columbia,
00:00:26.520 the province most hard hit by this crisis, drug overdoses now make up the leading cause of death
00:00:32.900 for BC youth aged 10 to 18. All the while, the federal government seeks to maintain their status
00:00:39.640 quo approach to promote so-called safe supply programs and repeating the slogan, safe supply
00:00:47.620 saves lives. In addition to all of that, the BC government is now planning to give taxpayer-funded
00:00:54.900 recreational fentanyl to minors with no minimum age listed. Fentanyl to kids.
00:01:01.240 Where is this poison that's killing so many Canadians even coming from? Well, our next guest,
00:01:06.020 a former undercover RCMP organized crime officer, says that China is waging a reverse opium war
00:01:13.000 on the West, a drug war on Canada, and believes that organized crime groups through the United
00:01:19.140 Front Work Department are supplying the poisonous precursor chemicals used to create fentanyl that's
00:01:25.680 killing Canada's future generations. Well, joining us now is Gary Clement, a policing veteran of 34
00:01:31.800 years, a former undercover officer, investigator, and also the former national director of the RCMP's
00:01:39.160 proceeds of crime program. He's also the author of the book Undercover, Inside the Shady World of
00:01:46.880 Organized Crime, and the RCMP. A link to that you can find in the description of this video.
00:01:52.220 Mr. Gary Clement, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you very much for having me, Harrison. I
00:01:56.480 appreciate it. In your latest column in the National Post, you say that the Chinese Communist Party
00:02:01.360 is waging a reverse opium war on the West, a drug war on Canada. What, if anything, is the Trudeau
00:02:07.960 government doing to protect Canadians and to save Canadian lives? Because from the data that we can see,
00:02:13.780 whatever they are doing doesn't appear to be working. Well, the problem is, and it's, you know,
00:02:20.820 people have to realize that we need in this country a multifaceted approach. And it starts with,
00:02:26.760 first of all, the government accepting we have an issue. You know, it's great. Everything we're doing,
00:02:32.120 in my view, unfortunately, is a band-aid approach. And it's not, it's not really getting to the root of
00:02:38.540 the problem. The root of the problem is, we, you know, when you take a look at what's happened over
00:02:43.840 the last 15 years in Canada, we've had, you know, court decisions like Stinchcomb, which is the
00:02:50.380 mandatory of full disclosure in a timely manner. We've had Jordan, which mandates a speedy trial.
00:02:58.000 And all of these things, you know, it's great in theory. And I, you know, it's great for the judges
00:03:02.540 to make all these pronouncements. But that should have required the, the, our politicians to take
00:03:10.540 some action. In other words, appoint more judges, make sure we have prosecutors are capable of carrying
00:03:16.180 it out. And then on top of that, you know, you look at the situation and we've, we've got so eroded
00:03:23.820 in our abilities to do federal enforcement. And for that, I'm pointing to the RCMP. I would say the last
00:03:30.620 15 years, they haven't showed up. Not through fault of their own, but there's a whole number
00:03:36.060 of factors that go into it. It's not that they don't have the skills throughout the organization,
00:03:41.420 but again, it goes to this proverbial problem. We need to wake up and recognize that, you know,
00:03:47.480 there's contract policing, there's federal policing, and the two are separate. And RCMP is supposed to be
00:03:53.440 a federally mandated organization. But unfortunately, the priority has become contracts. And as a
00:04:00.440 result of it, the federal side of the house has been eroded to a point where, as I said, we're not
00:04:07.220 even a threat of any sort. And what does that cause? Well, that has caused, you know, from 91 to 94,
00:04:14.780 it was in Hong Kong. I witnessed through our very lax immigration oversight, numerous triads or Asian
00:04:24.580 organized crime figures get access to this country. I wrote to the government and to the RCMP at that
00:04:32.680 time that if we didn't get our act together, that Vancouver would end up becoming a transshipment point
00:04:38.560 for all drugs into North America, and sadly now even into Australia, which meant it displaced Hong Kong,
00:04:47.820 Hong Kong that I knew from 91 to 94, all those things have come home to roost. We didn't take control
00:04:54.660 of our ports. We allowed investments from Chinese investors. We've allowed so many Chinese individuals
00:05:05.040 that are connected directly into the government of China to come to this country. They come with
00:05:12.620 massive amounts of money. And unfortunately, we've got a number of individuals that are swayed by money.
00:05:18.620 And I think that's become really evident. We're seeing it throughout this country. China has,
00:05:26.000 you know, really threatens their own diaspora because they want the Chinese people in this country
00:05:33.540 to continue to support China and their goals. And so the obligations on they will, you know, they want to
00:05:41.060 steal our intellectual property. And the, you know, the drug problem, if you look at it,
00:05:48.660 it's a disruption in North America of our society. And I've said for probably the last five, six years
00:05:56.340 that China is a communist country. If they wanted to shut down the trade, they could do it.
00:06:03.020 So that should tell people something. So we've had these precursors, drugs coming in through Mexico,
00:06:11.960 now direct to Vancouver, who's making fentanyl. And our drug situation, both in Canada, United States
00:06:19.620 is pathetic. We haven't come up with a solution and giving out free drugs, I think will prove itself to
00:06:26.700 be a fatal mistake. But we need to come up with some solutions. Probably the first solution we
00:06:32.580 should come up with is get ourselves back in the International Game Board of being able to thwart
00:06:38.620 some of this criminal activity, thwart some of this money laundering that's occurring. I mean,
00:06:43.200 the Cullen Commission, I think, really highlighted just how weak a system we have in this country.
00:06:49.460 We've done a great job of building a FinTrack. And I know, Colin, there was some criticism of it. But I
00:06:57.140 can tell you, they've, they've built, and I use the analogy, we built a great Rolls Royce,
00:07:03.540 being FinTrack, requiring financial institutions of all stripes to report into it. But what's the engine
00:07:11.220 going that's going to drive it? And that has to be prosecution enforcement. But in order to have great
00:07:17.220 prosecution enforcement, we really need to have strengthen our legal frameworks, so that it's even
00:07:24.180 capable of doing it. This arrest and immediately letting these people out on the street has proven,
00:07:31.780 again, another fatality in this country, in my view. And it's not what we have to look at. If it was
00:07:38.900 just China, you can sort of say, well, you know, I think we can get this under control. But we are
00:07:45.380 dealing with India now, we're dealing with Iran now in proportions that I don't think any of us ever
00:07:51.620 thought would happen. We've got Russia, that's Russian organized crime is here. The number of
00:07:57.700 organized crime groups that are active in this country is scary, to say the least. The problem for
00:08:04.260 me when I look at it is, it's terrible that we have become the transshipment point for drugs and money
00:08:11.940 laundering throughout the world. And we're recognized now as that. And our government
00:08:18.420 is not even a, is even given any, a bit of confidence on the world stage today because of this.
00:08:27.780 Where, you know, you look at the five eyes and what's happened. You know, and for me, that's
00:08:32.740 disheartening. You know, I could say when I was fortunate to be in the RCMP, at the time I was in it,
00:08:39.380 we had a tremendous reputation both internationally, within our US partners, I did training all over the
00:08:45.940 world, because we were recognized that we had that ability. That's not the case today. And that's sad.
00:08:52.100 And we all of us as Canadians, you know, I look at the good analogy for people, you know, from British
00:08:58.100 Columbia to look at is the fight that's going on in Surrey, about, you know, maintaining the RCMP in
00:09:04.900 Surrey. And you know, that's great in theory. And I respect what they're saying, but what they're
00:09:09.460 missing the boat. Bottom line is in 73, when I was in Langley, there was talk of a regional police
00:09:15.620 service in the lower mainland. I mean, I think it's far, it's now time that that proceed. And so that
00:09:22.740 enforcement in British Columbia can be localized, it can be provincially generated. And then the public
00:09:29.620 has to realize if that happened, there'd be resources to take on the federal problem that
00:09:34.900 exists, which is massive. And if we don't take it on, that's an impact to all the municipalities
00:09:41.620 and the province, and it's costing them a lot of money, because we can't take it on. And you know,
00:09:47.300 the latest thing is, you know, the RCMP was trying to have direct entry into these specialized units,
00:09:53.940 the units or the association filed a complaint with the labor board and won it. And but all they did
00:10:00.660 is kick the ball down the road. And sadly, they're short sighted. The reality of it is to the Canadian
00:10:06.900 public, they want to see an ability to have a federal enforcement. And all they've done is delayed
00:10:12.820 that. Well, that means we continue to be this weak link in the international chain. And I think those
00:10:19.060 are the things that, you know, government really needs to wake up to, but more so the public has
00:10:24.180 to recognize that organized crime is costing them a lot of money. In extra enforcement, we look at the
00:10:30.500 drug problem. The drug problem is also backing up our hospitals. Because every time you, you get
00:10:36.180 somebody with an overdose rushing into an emergency ward, there's four people tied up that could be
00:10:40.900 dealing with ordinary real problems rather than a pandemic caused by what's happening in the drug
00:10:49.540 trade and principally through China. So those are the things that concern me. You know, as you can
00:10:54.980 appreciate, I've been doing this a lot of years, I'm still active. And I'm still active, because I'm
00:11:00.500 hoping by still being active, my voice can be heard a little bit. And that maybe we can get some,
00:11:06.180 some, some, I guess, support from our government leaders to recognize that we really have to take
00:11:14.740 this on sooner rather than later. And I think I owe it to your generation. I owe it to my future
00:11:24.820 grandchildren. I don't want to see the country that we're in today. You know, I'm, you know, I work in a
00:11:31.780 bank today. And believe it or not, I'm seeing things there that are impacted by organized crime that is
00:11:37.700 very disheartening, would have never happened 15 years ago, but it's happening today. And it's
00:11:42.340 happening because we almost have an open door policy. We've got to get our act together and get
00:11:47.380 control of this. And we, you know, don't get me wrong, I believe in some of the things that happened
00:11:52.100 out of this sort of this woke philosophy, but it's gone way too far. Canada, the state has a right to
00:11:59.060 protect itself. The state has an obligation to protect its citizens. And we can't continually bend
00:12:07.460 to a silent minority. It's really impacting us. We can't continually bend to ethnic groups for their
00:12:15.540 own ethnic focuses. I mean, we're Canada, we're one country. And I think it's time that we look at
00:12:22.340 it from that perspective. And we start doing things what's to the betterment of the community.
00:12:26.820 Certainly. I want to get into the United Front Work Department and how their indirect involvement
00:12:33.700 in the illicit drug trade in this country is killing Canadians. Canadians will be familiar
00:12:39.540 with the United Front Work Department through the stories about how they're operating Chinese police
00:12:44.180 stations and their political interference, but maybe not necessarily as much about their organized
00:12:50.420 crime activities. So can you explain how exactly their involvement has has allowed fentanyl to make
00:12:57.700 its way deep into the interior of this country and ravage cities like Thunder Bay?
00:13:03.940 Yeah, you know, it's sad, but I go back, I have to go back to the 90s again, when we started allowing all
00:13:09.780 these individuals to come into this country. And basically what we did very much like we've sat back and
00:13:15.380 witnessed Hell's Angels create a network worldwide. That's exactly what happened in a situation like
00:13:23.460 this. So United Front are located in most cities throughout Canada. They have ties to these individuals
00:13:32.420 that are directly connected to organized crime. A lot of them are directly connected to the ruling party in
00:13:39.940 in China. So in other words, a communist party. So although they may not take total direction,
00:13:48.420 it's not like it's a hierarchical role. The bottom line is they still have affiliations with Chinese
00:13:57.140 organized crime. And they also help to control or try to control the Chinese diaspora in each of these areas.
00:14:05.620 And so that's how all of this works. And as a result of it, the drug trade is just one of the ways that
00:14:14.980 they make money that helps fund what happens in China. But I think there's another side of it that
00:14:23.460 I was at a bond or I was in London. That's where our bank is located. I stayed at a hotel and I was
00:14:30.500 talking to this couple out of Richmond. They're of Chinese descent. We got talking and when they
00:14:36.660 realized that I understood the Chinese diaspora and I understood the triads and all that, they said to me,
00:14:42.900 do you realize that most of the businesses in Chinese business in Richmond are having to pay protection
00:14:49.140 money? And I said, yeah, that doesn't surprise me. That went on in Hong Kong when I was there. And it's
00:14:56.420 just been transplanted over into our country. And if you were to ask most police officers,
00:15:03.540 they wouldn't even understand it. They wouldn't even realize it. And because the Chinese diaspora
00:15:10.580 do not believe that law enforcement in this country understand the threats that are against them,
00:15:16.100 they're not going to go to the police. It's like Iranian citizens, they feel the same way. They don't
00:15:21.220 believe we really understand it or we are really interested in doing something about it. So that's
00:15:27.460 the reason all of this continues to grow and individuals are exploited. Right. In December,
00:15:34.980 the Washington Post wrote this long article about these Canadian fentanyl super labs where Canadians are
00:15:43.060 now building the synthetic fentanyl using chemicals sourced from China and we're shipping them out to
00:15:50.500 Australia and New Zealand. We're now involved in spreading this killer drug, which has been ravaging
00:15:56.100 our own people. How has this been allowed to happen? How has it become the case that Canada is now
00:16:01.860 in the fentanyl business somehow, despite the fact that we're trying to defend our own people from this
00:16:06.980 drug? Well, if you stop and think about it, Harrison, it goes right back to what I said at the outset.
00:16:12.420 Where is federal enforcement today? You know, when I started, and I think this sort of puts
00:16:18.500 in perspective, when I started in Vancouver, we had a very large drug section dedicated to drug
00:16:26.180 enforcement. We broke it out by the type of drugs. We were capable of taking on organized crime and
00:16:33.220 we would take on, at that time, I can remember we had some methamphetamine labs being set up. So we
00:16:39.940 targeted them right away and we shut down about a half dozen, very short order. But we had the resources,
00:16:44.980 we had over 30 individuals, investigators are capable of doing that. That doesn't exist today.
00:16:51.140 And so what we're seeing, again, I go back to what I said at the outset, we need to get our federal
00:16:56.420 house in order. And until we do that, we're going to see these type of labs spurring up. And so who does
00:17:02.500 it, who does that responsibility fall to? Unfortunately, it falls to the municipal police forces.
00:17:09.140 And they're already stretched to a max, let's be honest, they have every other thing on their
00:17:13.860 plate and they're stretched to a max. So we need to wake up and realize the RCMP has to stop being
00:17:19.940 all things to all people. We need to look at what is it in this very complex world we live in today,
00:17:26.340 in this complex world of organized crime, how do we end up with an organization capable of targeting
00:17:33.220 transnational organized crime? And it sure will never be doing what they're doing today. It's not
00:17:38.180 going to happen. In your article, you say that in order to really solve this problem, the debate
00:17:44.100 shouldn't be on safe supply programs. It should mostly be on trying to target and shut down the
00:17:50.340 illicit supply. However, the federal government is sticking to their guns on safe supply. So is the BC
00:17:56.340 government. So are other governments across this country. And BC just set a record this last year
00:18:02.180 for the highest amount of illicit drug overdose deaths, despite, you know, the federal government
00:18:08.100 will say safe supply saves lives. It's clearly not saving lives. And this has to be a serious
00:18:14.500 problem for law enforcement officials at this point, right? It is. And, you know, I guess
00:18:21.620 I'm surprised as a country, and maybe it goes that everybody's again going back and looking for a
00:18:27.460 band-aid approach. There's other countries that tried this and are admitting that it's a colossal
00:18:34.500 failure. Why we jumped into this, I'll never know. I mean, let's face it. People that are on drugs,
00:18:43.220 like fentanyl, that are hooked, are not capable of making an informed decision. My daughter works in the
00:18:50.420 mental health field and she's dealing with it every day. So how do you deal with that? Well, if it's an
00:18:55.300 individual on the street, and they're not and they're going wild and everything, you're probably
00:19:01.060 going to have them what they call formed, and you're going to have them in an institution to deal
00:19:05.700 with that issue. I hate to say it, and I believe in the chart of rights, and I believe in individual
00:19:11.300 rights. But why do we continue to give more drugs, which is going to lead to more health effects,
00:19:17.700 what's going to lead to more hospitalizations, and eventually a shortened lifespan, when we should be
00:19:24.500 looking at how do we treat people and recognize it. In my view, and I saw it when I worked undercover
00:19:30.740 in the streets with heroin addicts, they cannot make an informed decision on what they're going to
00:19:38.660 do because the drug is the thing that drives them. Well, the BC government now wants to give safe
00:19:45.140 fentanyl to children and provide safe fentanyl, so-called safe fentanyl to adolescents. I mean,
00:19:52.020 talk about doubling down on a failed policy. Well, and I think that's happened because whether
00:19:57.380 it's true or not, but I've read a lot where a lot of the safe drug that is being handed out
00:20:04.020 isn't strong enough for the committed users of fentanyl, so they're selling it to younger generations.
00:20:09.940 If that's the case, and I have no reason to doubt that that's happening,
00:20:14.420 what is the end goal? I would really like to ask them when they start talking about safe drug supply,
00:20:22.180 give me a response. What is the end goal for society? Because I can tell you, I don't think
00:20:27.300 they have one. They're looking at that bandaid and say, oh, look, we did. We did something,
00:20:33.060 but it's not effective. It's not helping society, and it's only leading us down a path I don't think we
00:20:39.300 want to be on. Certainly. Well, to wrap up, Gary, if you could change one thing or make one major
00:20:45.700 change to how the country deals with the illicit fentanyl crisis, the supply of illicit fentanyl,
00:20:52.340 what would it be? Well, I think, first of all, I would, I think we need a, I've said in a couple
00:21:00.100 articles I've written that we really need powerful drugs are in this country that can liaise between
00:21:09.540 law enforcement, provincial and federal governments that can make recommendations that have to be
00:21:16.260 followed. And we need the RCMP to become a federal focused organization so that we can start getting
00:21:25.860 a handle on this. Amazing. Thank you so much, Gary. Really appreciate it. Thanks, Harrison. I do
00:21:32.660 appreciate it. Take care now. Bye now.