Police in Dali City in the western part of Yunnan Province, southwest China, have seized 501 kg of heroin and captured two suspects, the Provincial Narcotics Control Bureau announced on Sunday.

This was the biggest haul of heroin seized this year in the country, according to Li Yuanzheng, deputy director of the Narcotics Control Bureau under the Chinese Ministry of Public Security.

Local police were tipped off in early June that a gang in the northern boundary areas of Myanmar was scheming to steal drugs from Myanmar into the province, and then forward the drugs to China's coastal areas through southwestern Chongqing municipality, said Sun Dahong, deputy director of the provincial public security department.

Sun acknowledged that the gang's final aim is to sell the drugs on the world market through the country's coastal southern and eastern regions.

Yunnan province set up a special panel to stop the drug traffickers and, working in cooperation with its counterpart in Chongqing, the panel found the gang had bought vehicles in late May for drug trafficking and hid the drugs in the tanks which have been refitted.

Local police intercepted and captured the suspects along with vehicles in mid-June and the heroin was spotted hidden in the tank, noted Sun.

Yunnan, a province with more than 4,000 km of border line with Myanmar, Thailand and Laos, notoriously known as the golden triangle, has been designated as a target area for clamping down on the influx of drugs.

(Xinhua News Agency June 21, 2004)