Meth made in Canada entering New Zealand

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 10/12/2018 (2584 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Canada is making meth and exporting it to New Zealand, the Free Press has learned.

“We are currently aware that New Zealand is a destination country,” Public Safety Canada spokeswoman Zarah Malik wrote in an email, after an official from the department told Parliament that Canada is becoming a “transit country” for meth, by importing ingredients and exporting the drug.

Public Safety Canada said it couldn’t determine where in Canada the meth is being assembled.

“In some cases, we’re seeing Canada being used as a transit country, where methamphetamine is being exported,” Trevor Bhupsingh, PSC’s border strategies director, told the House health committee on Nov. 29.

He said organized crime imports components of the drug, which are “then being assembled here” and sent to countries. He didn’t name them.

The Free Press asked for details, and the department responded eight days later, saying it wasn’t sure if the meth that is being exported comes from Winnipeg.

“The clandestine nature of illegal drug exportation from Canada to any country makes it difficult to determine exactly where export activity comes from,” Malik wrote.

The Canada Border Services Agency “works with domestic and international law enforcement partners to identify and interdict goods subject to export controls,” she added.

Canada fights international drug trafficking through bodies such as the UN narcotics task force, which shares information on substance use.

New Zealand’s high commission in Ottawa did not respond when asked whether it was aware of this phenomenon, and if Canada has done anything to combat it.

RCMP have confirmed reports from Winnipeg police that meth in the city largely comes from Mexico, with additives from India and China.

Premier Brian Pallister raised Manitoba’s meth crisis at a Dec. 6 dinner with fellow premiers and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Pallister told the Free Press there were no firm commitments from Ottawa “but good dialogue with several of the premiers” on both issues.

“It seems that there are many different, nuanced options that people are pursuing. And there’s no one-size-fits-all and there’s no quick fix. It looks like it’s just a challenge we’re just going to have to keep plugging away at, and other provinces are basically putting it in those terms.”

Winnipeg Mayor Brian Bowman is set to testify Tuesday morning at the parliamentary hearing, along with the head of Brandon’s RJ Streetz Foundation, which has raised money for services for meth users that public systems don’t provide.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca