Some eight snakeheads have been nabbed in the past three months, and 33 people who tried to run a blockade have been detained.

Beginning April 1, the country has been conducting a campaign against illegal emigrants.

Officials said that due to the strike hard policy on stowaways, the number of illegal emigrants has dropped in recent years. Last year, some 9,465 stowaways were caught, down 18 per cent on the figure for the previous year.

At the station on April 19, two adult men with fake passports were arrested with four children when they were going to bring the younger onto a flight to Vancouver.

Nowadays, since more people are tending to run a blockade to Europe and America, staff from the station reinforced their inspection on these flights. On May 7, a man who was about to board a flight to Los Angeles and spoke fluent English, claiming that had lived in New York for many years, was stopped by inspectors. He finally admitted that he had bought the passport from a snakehead.

On June 23, another six people who wanted to stow away to Canada were caught.

To leave no loophole, the station also joined hands with provincial departments. On June 12, with the co-operation of police from Wenzhou in East China's Zhejiang Province, the station caught a man who was suspected of helping 183 people run a blockade.

( China Daily July 23, 2002)