South China police capture 172 drug fugitives

GUANGZHOU -- Police in a southern Chinese city rampant with production of drugs have caught 172 fugitives involved in drugs crimes.

Since May, police from Lufeng city, Guangdong province, have been looking for 328 suspects who fled the city, 172 of whom have now been caught, according to Lin Chunjia, deputy Communist Party of China chief of the city police, at a press conference on Thursday.

"We put information about the fugitives on TV and the Internet, and handed out 50,000 fliers," Lin said.

The police have offered cash rewards of 30,000 yuan ($4,330) for information leading to the capture of each fugitive, with a total of more than 5 million yuan already rewarded, Lin said. Among the 172, 40 were caught in this way, while another 49 turned themselves in.

During the campaign, the local police cracked over 200 drugs cases, raided 40 production sites, arrested 416 suspects, and seized more than 6.8 tonnes of methamphetamine, 4.26 tonnes of which was in liquid form.

Emerging as a major meth production base in 2008, Lufeng is a major target of the National Narcotic Control Commission.