‘Asian El Chapo’ Tse Chi Lop extradited to Australia to face drug trafficking charges

One of the world’s most wanted alleged drug lords – the so-called “Asian El Chapo’’ Tse Chi Lop – to face court in Victoria on charges connected to multibillion-dollar smuggling operation.

The so-called Asian El Chapo, Tse Chi Lop. Picture: File

One of the world’s most wanted alleged drug lords – the so-called “Asian El Chapo’’ Tse Chi Lop – is back in Australia after losing a 12-month fight against his extradition from the Netherlands.

Tse, 59, touched down at Melbourne Airport this morning.

He will face trial in the Victorian courts accused of conspiracy to traffic in commercial quantities of controlled drugs.

The arrival on Australian soil of the Chinese-born Canadian billionaire is a coup for the Australian Federal Police, who have led a decade-long global hunt for the alleged ringleader of a syndicate accused of operating a multibillion-dollar drug smuggling operation across a dozen countries in Asia and the Pacific, including Japan, New Zealand and Australia.

The scale of Tse’s alleged offending has led him to be compared to the notorious Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo’’ Guzman, and in Australian law enforcement circles he is referred to as T1 – target number one on the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission’s list of Australian Priority Organisation Targets (APOTs).

Tse Chi Lop.

Lee Chung Chak.

Police allege Tse engaged in drug-smuggling activities which are the subject of the current charges after fleeing to Asia from Canada in 2006, and that he moved between Hong Kong, Taiwan and the gambling mecca of Macau as he allegedly ran his drug business.

The syndicate he is alleged to lead, known as The Company, or the Sam Gor Syndicate, was formed after the amalgamation of up to five notorious Asian drug-smuggling Triad groups.

It is thought to have been involved in smuggling up to 70 per cent of the methamphetamine, heroin and ketamine which has been flooding into Australia since at least 2008.

Its modus operandi was to allegedly import huge amounts of the drug, mainly highly-addictive methamphetamine, or ice, into Australia concealed in shipments of tea. The Company is alleged to have links to Australian outlaw motorcycle gangs, including the nation’s largest gang, the Comanchero.

Millions of dollars in The Company’s drug profits are suspected to have been laundered through Crown’s casino in Melbourne and Perth, through payments made to a junket operator who brought Chinese high-rollers in to gamble.

Tse was arrested in the Netherlands on January 22, grabbed by the National Police acting on an Interpol red notice as he tried to board a plane while transiting through Schiphol Airport.

Australian Federal Police, who had issued an arrest warrant for him in 2019, then sought to extradite him.

Heroin and methamphetamine were discovered by the Australian Federal Police during a raid on a person allegedly connected to the “Asian El Chapo”, Tse Chi Lop. Picture: File

Denying allegations of involvement with the syndicate, Tse fought the extradition, and claimed Australian authorities had essentially set him up by arranging for his flight to stop in the Netherlands so he could be arrested. He was mid-journey to Canada at the time after being expelled from Taiwan.

The courts rejected his argument and in July agreed he would be handed over to Australia.

“The syndicate targeted Australia over a number of years, importing and distributing large amounts of illicit narcotics, laundering the profits overseas and living off the wealth obtained from crime,’’ the AFP said in a statement issued after Tse’s arrest in January.

Tse was born in Guangdong Province in China in 1963 but migrated to Canada sometimes in the 1980s.

A special investigation by Reuters in 2019 uncovered claims that Tse was guarded by up to eight Thai kickboxers, that he flew on private jets, and had once dropped $95 million in a Macau casino in a single night.

A yellow Lamborghini seized in raids on a person allegedly connected to Tse Chi Lop.

American, Canadian, European and Asian law enforcement agencies have been probing the activities of The Company, including its apparent use of laboratories in conflict-plagued Myanmar’s Shan State, in the infamous Golden Triangle, to produce methamphetamine. Precursor chemicals were believed to have been exported in huge volumes from China.

In June, a man alleged to be a key lieutenant of Tse’s, Lee Chung Chak, 66, arrived into Australia after being extradited from Thailand.

He was charged over the alleged importation of 42 kilograms of drugs, mainly methamphetamine, into Australia in 2012, but remains under investigation into other alleged activities including the payment of money to the Crown casino junket operator.

The Australian Federal Police allege Lee, a dual Chinese-British national, is a senior associate of Tse and responsible for shipping narcotics into Australia a decade ago. He was arrested in Bangkok in October 2020 by the Royal Thai Police’s Narcotics Suppression Bureau.

Another alleged associate of Tse’s, Wan Kuok-koi, also known as 14K Triad boss “Broken Tooth’’ from Macau, is wanted in Malaysia for fraud, and is believed to be in hiding.

Wan Kuok-koi, better known as "Broken Tooth Koi". Picture: File

He was sanctioned by the US Government in December 2020 over concerns his drug and gambling activities had become entwined with China’s controversial Belt and Road Initiative, which seeks to develop Chinese-built or owned infrastructure in strategic countries.

Wan has previously been convicted of illegal gambling, attempted car-bombing of a police officer and operating as a loan shark, and spent time in a Malaysian prison.

The arrival of Tse onshore comes as the AFP under Commissioner Reece Kershaw refocused their efforts on targeting people offshore who are accused of being involved in serious crime.

In matters unrelated to Tse and Lee, others brought back to Australia to face trial include alleged Comanchero bike boss Mark Buddle, arrested in Darwin in August after being deported from Turkey, alleged crime figure Tony Haddad, also deported from Turkey in December, and alleged senior member of Islamic State Neil Prakash, also deported from Turkey and sent to Australia on the same plane as Haddad.