KEY POINTS
- A man accused of drug trafficking has been extradited from the Netherlands to Victoria.
- Police allege Tse Chi Lop was part of a conspiracy to traffic millions of dollars worth of methamphetamine.
- Their investigation involved the force's transnational offshore disruption taskforce.
The alleged kingpin of a global drug trafficking syndicate has been extradited to face a Melbourne court in what federal police have described as one of the most significant arrests in its history.
The Australian Federal Police has charged Canadian national Tse Chi Lop after a long-running investigation into transnational organised crime syndicate Sam Gor - "Third Brother" in Cantonese - which is also also known as The Company.
The 59-year-old faced Melbourne Magistrates Court on Thursday, with police alleging he was part of a conspiracy to traffic methamphetamine, or derivatives of the drug, totalling 20kg between March 2012 and March 2013.
The drugs have a street value of up to $4.4 million dollars and were split up into separate quantities, police allege.
He did not apply for bail and was escorted from court to jail in an armoured police vehicle.
Police outside a secure court in Rotterdam, Netherlands, last year prior to the hearing on the extradition of Tse Chi Lop. Mr Tse has since been extradited to Victoria. Source: Getty, AFP / Robin Utrecht
Mr Tse – who has been compared to Mexican former drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman – was arrested at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on 22 January last year by Dutch officers after the AFP requested an INTERPOL "red notice" for his provisional arrest. He was extradited to Australia from the Netherlands on Thursday.
Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner Krissy Barrett described Mr Tse's arrest as "extremely significant" not only for the force, but for the Australian community.
"It would be one of the most significant arrests in the history of the (force)," she told reporters.
The Australian Federal Police in June this year also charged a Chinese-British dual national, 66-year-old Chung Chak Lee, with conspiring to traffic commercial quantities of drugs.
The 66-year-old is alleged to be Mr Tse's co-offender.
The police force alleges the men conspired with junior Australian-based syndicate members to transport drugs between Sydney and Melbourne, and the syndicate laundered money through remitters offshore and in Australia.
