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The Canadian border agency is in a constant cat-and-mouse game with criminal organizations trying to import dangerous narcotics, as well as ingredients for fentanyl, sometimes through “creative” means, a senior border official says.
In an interview with CBC Home As part of the show’s ongoing coverage of the toxic drug crisis, Aaron McCrorie, vice-president of intelligence and enforcement at the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), said officers have seen a wide variety of “innovative” methods. to smuggle drugs.
“We see shipments hidden in machine parts. Dissolved in liquids and shipped as maple syrup, for example. Hidden in baking tools,” McCrorie told host Catherine Cullen.
“It’s an ever-evolving game where we’re constantly looking for new and different tactics to smuggle drugs into or out of the country.”
14:26Sniffing out drugs at the border
featured videoSmugglers are using more creative and sophisticated ways to move illicit drugs across the border, and this week The House gets a rare demonstration from CBSA’s sniffer dog, Loki, of how he detects narcotics at the border. We then heard Aaron McCrorie, Vice-President of Intelligence and Enforcement at the Canada Border Services Agency, talk about the ways drugs are hidden and why precursor chemicals (the ingredients used to make drugs) are becoming an major problem.
An average of 21 people die every day in Canada due to the toxic drug crisis. Fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid, is implicated in many of these deaths.
But a significant portion of the fentanyl in Canada (or the substances used to make it) originates overseas.
According to the CBSA, 496 grams of fentanyl were seized in the first half of this year, along with almost 31,000 kilograms of other narcotics, drugs and chemicals during the first two quarters of 2023.
Two milligrams of fentanyl is considered a lethal dose.
Among the tools used by the CBSA in its work to stop the flow of drugs are sniffer dog teams, like the one visited Home at the Lansdowne border crossing in eastern Ontario.
Dog teams like Patterson and Loki are part of the CBSA’s strategy to clamp down on the flow of illegal drugs across the Canadian border. (Kristen Everson/CBC)
Speaking with Cullen, McCrorie reiterated what Home I heard from the RCMP earlier this month that criminal organizations in Canada produce fentanyl both for domestic consumption and for sale abroad.
Key markets for Canadian fentanyl include the United States, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, law enforcement officials say.
CBSA is in charge of intercepting shipments, whether imported or exported.
“The challenge for us is that they are constantly changing,” McCrorie said.
“We are constantly looking for new and different ways of concealment, sharing that information with your frontline staff and people like our dog team so they can successfully intercept drug shipments coming into the country.”
More and more shipments of chemical precursors
One trend noted by CBSA officials in 2023 is an increasing number of shipments containing fentanyl’s key ingredients, rather than the entire drug.
“We are seeing a decrease in the amount of fentanyl coming into the country, but we are seeing increases in the number of precursors coming into the country,” McCrorie said.
Most fentanyl precursor chemicals are imported into Canada from China, either directly or by transshipment through the United States or South American countries, officials say.
For years, Canada has collaborated with China to combat the illegal flow of fentanyl and other opioids. The United States recently agreed to restart its own cooperation on the issue following a meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The federal government also recently moved to regulate some fentanyl precursors.
McCrorie said the challenge with precursors is that they sometimes have legitimate purposes, making it difficult for regulations to keep up, or the chemical composition could change quickly.
“It’s a constant battle on our part to identify new precursors coming into the country and then work with our partners, like at Health Canada, for example, to get those precursors on the list so we can stop them coming in.”
McCrorie said Canada’s ability to stop drugs at the border is an important part of the overall fight against the toxic drug crisis, but it is only one part.
“It’s not just about banning drugs, it’s also about harm reduction. It’s also about stopping people from starting to use these drugs in the first place,” he said.
“I have colleagues across the city, across the country, across the world who are addressing this. Every interdiction, even if it’s one dose, we’re saving a life. We just have to keep doing that, keep making a difference and changing the course”.