Drug trade: The Malaysian cousins

When two Malaysian cousins arrived at Auckland Airport with 4.5kg of heroin and 1kg of crystal methamphetamine, known as ice, in 2001, it triggered an investigation that contained surprises for police and Customs.

Caught red-handed, the pair, Suresh Kumar and Mahendra Kanagalingam, agreed to co-operate and went ahead with the pre-arranged drop-off at a city hotel. Drugs squad and Customs officers arrested the pair and two men who were waiting for the shipment, Christian Damian Wickremasinghe, of Sydney, and Anton David Isaac, of Howick.

Phone records enabled investigators to draw a link between the smuggling operation and an international narcotics syndicate stretching from Vietnam, Thailand, and Malaysia to New Zealand and Australia.

Drug intelligence officers say due to information received from overseas colleagues, they were expecting the consignments carried by the Malaysian cousins - but officers thought they were going to find ecstasy.

"When it came as 4.5kg of heroin and 1kg of ice, it was an indication that these Asian groups had identified a good market for Ice," says a senior police figure.

"We had only seen ice coming in in small amounts since 2000 but we believe that they had realised that with the large production of meth in labs within New Zealand, the gap in the market was at the top end - ice."

Customs drug manager Simon Williamson believes the heroin was most likely destined for Australia, but the ice was for New Zealand.

"The danger for any country that is used as a transit point is that you get what we call spillage," he says. "It's only a matter of time before those networks will look to offset costs by supplying segments of that import into the local market."

In the 2001 case, it was a straightforward business decision: New Zealand does not have a big demand for heroin. But if the syndicate could piggy-back on the popularity of P by introducing the country to its more potent sister drug, ice, then it would be a nice side-earner. And though at 4 million New Zealand's population is small, it has a record demonstrating the willingness of users to pay top dollar for drugs.