$46m of Drug Chemical Found in Coffee

Police have seized $46 million worth of pseudoephedrine hidden in dozens of boxes of coffee in one of the largest seizures in Australia.

Police believe the seizure of 174 kilograms of pseudoephedrine, the key ingredient in the manufacture of ice, will have a significant impact on the drug trade on Sydney's streets.

The pseudoephedrine, which police estimated could have manufactured 130kg of methamphetamine or ice, was allegedly found hidden in dozens of boxes of coffee which arrived in Sydney in a shipping container from Vietnam on August 9.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) described the operation as a highly organised international criminal syndicate.

In a joint operation involving Customs, the AFP and the Australian Crime Commission, the drugs were tracked as they were transported from Port Botany to Revesby, and later Chipping Norton in Sydney's west.

Chemicals were subsequently uncovered at a house, police said.

Two Sydney men were arrested on Tuesday night as they left a home at Heckenberg, in Sydney's west.

The deputy manager of the AFP's Sydney office, Mick Kelsey, said on Wednesday he expected more arrests.

Superintendent Kelsey said the manufacture of ice in clandestine laboratories had been on the rise in Australia in the past few years and posed an increasing threat to communities.

"Makeshift laboratories, such as where this pseudoephedrine was headed, pose a real threat to the community and to the people living in the community, not to mention the people that are actually attempting to manufacture the narcotics," he told reporters.

"This is the largest seizure of pseudoephedrine by the AFP this year and it's one of the largest in our history.

"So we would expect it will have a significant impact on the supply of those end-product narcotics on the street."

Van Thanh Ngo, 44, of Green Valley in Sydney's west and Peter Thea, 25, of Chipping Norton, were each charged with one count of importing commercial quantities of pseudoephedrine and one count of attempting to possess the chemical.

Magistrate Allan Moore refused bail for both men when they appeared in Central Local Court on Wednesday. They were remanded in custody to reappear in the same court on September 29.

From: SMH.COM.AU