AFRICAN CRIME GANGS GAINING A FOOTHOLD ON AUSTRALIAN DRUG MARKET

West African crime syndicates, specialising in fraud, people smuggling and
small-scale drug trafficking, are targeting Australia, claim Federal Police.

In the past 10 months, five people identified by police as being members of
West African organised crime gangs have been arrested and charged with drug
offences. Three others linked to the syndicates have been arrested over
credit card fraud and forged passports. Federal Police say the groups are
also involved in illegal immigration rackets and money laundering.

Most of them involve Nigerian criminals, but similar groups are operating
from nearby countries, including Gabon, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast,
Liberia and more recently South Africa.

Australian Federal Police agent Dick Moses said the earliest recorded
arrest of a Nigerian drug smuggler was 1989 at Sydney airport. "No further
significant West African [drug smugglers] were arrested until 1999. Since
then, numerous importers have been arrested and significant quantities of
narcotics seized."

In March last year, two West African organised crime members were arrested
and charged over smuggling 2.6 kilograms of cocaine.

In other operations, Federal Police have seized 17 stolen passports, 16
false credit cards and two false passports.

Mr Moses said the syndicates were entrepreneurial and businesslike. While
they were not importing huge amounts of drugs, they used a scatter-gun
approach involving "small, numerous and diverse ... forms of importation
[such as] body packs, internals and couriered packages".

"We see them like worker bees, buzzing around all over the place, doing
jobs everywhere," he said.

He said while the mainly Nigerian crime groups had been operating in other
countries for at least a decade, they had only come to notice in Australia
in the last couple of years.

The syndicates are run as "loose cells", as opposed to the more typical
pyramid structure.

"Cell leaders hold regular meetings ... syndicates have been holding
debriefings in order to learn from their successes and failures," Mr Moses
said.

They conducted their own research into various business and police methods
and frequently used multiple identities and forged diplomatic passports.

The groups had also flourished because Nigerians were frequent travellers
and possessed "strong allegiances to the extended family who often reside
world wide".

"They are well organised, the way they are set up, and we consider the
threat to Australia is going to be high," Mr Moses said.

The syndicates were active in other parts of the world such as London,
Chicago, Islamabad and Johannesburg.

In Bangkok, the syndicates were responsible for most heroin trafficking,
and were "actively targeting Australia as a lucrative heroin market".