U.S. Treasury Blocks Bitcoin Addresses of Alleged Chinese Drug Traffickers
With the overall growing crypto activity around the globe, the U.S. regulators have turned vigilant and observing any illicit activities through their regulatory lenses.
Recently, the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) blacklisted cryptocurrency addresses of three Chinese officials alleged to be involved in drug trafficking and money laundering.
The three narcotics drug traffickers named by OFAC include Xiaobing Yan, Fujing Zheng and Guanghua Zheng, and have been charged under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act. The regulators have frozen all their assets and properties inside the U.S. Besides, they have also seized that passports preventing them to travel anywhere outside the country.
Additionally, the regulators have also blocked the Bitcoin and Litecoin addresses which belong to the Chinese citizens, as per the claims made by OFAC.
Apart from these three individuals, OFAC also listed the Zheng Drug Trafficking Organization and Qinsheng Pharmaceutical Technology Co. Ltd involved in the malicious practices.
The OFAC has appraised other regulators like FinCEN and law-enforcement agencies of this concerning situation. In a statement on Wednesday, August 21, the Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Sigal Mandelkar added that his agency has well coordinated with other regional and national agencies before taking these decisions.
“The Chinese kingpins that OFAC designated today run an international drug trafficking operation that manufactures and sells lethal narcotics, directly contributing to the crisis of opioid addiction, overdoses, and death in the United States. Zheng and Yan have shipped hundreds of packages of synthetic opioids to the U.S., targeting customers through online advertising and sales, and using commercial mail carriers to smuggle their drugs into the United States,” said Mandelkar.
He added: “OFAC and FinCEN’s coordinated action with U.S. law enforcement leverages Treasury’s authorities to confront the deadly synthetic opioid crisis plaguing America.”
FinCEN Director Kenneth A. Blanco also issued a statement alerting financial institutions to keep a strict watch on schemes related to the trafficking of synthetic opioids and fentanyl.
Blanco added: “We are making the financial sector aware of tactics and typologies behind illicit schemes to launder the proceeds of these fatal drug sales, including transactions using digital currency and foreign bank accounts. Financial institutions must be on alert to red flags and other indicators of the complex schemes fentanyl traffickers are employing so that financial institutions can report and share relevant information with law enforcement, and ultimately help save lives.”