US fentanyl claim a 'distortion of facts'

Country has only itself to blame for its opioid abuse crisis, senior official says

The United States' accusation that many US citizens have died because China failed to prevent fentanyl from entering the country is not true, a senior Chinese anti-drug official said on Saturday.

"It is true that the US has a high death rate from the proliferation of fentanyl-related substances, but the US has only itself to blame for the fentanyl abuse crisis and China is not the main source of fentanyl in the country," Liu Yuejin, deputy director of the National Narcotics Control Commission, China's leading drug enforcement body, said in an interview with China Central Television.