Alleged kingpin had advanced education from a prestigious Chinese university, police say

Police in Wenzhou, Zhejiang province, have identified "a large number" of suspected drug users at dozens of universities nationwide and arrested 23 drug producers and online drug dealers they said were involved in a trafficking network.

Police in the Longwan district of Wenzhou also confiscated more than 200 kilograms of illegal drugs, mostly marijuana, the district police said on Monday.

The police identified a large number of college students who were buyers of the illegal drugs, as well as a number of high school students who were allegedly involved.

The police discovered clues of suspected drug dealing in several online chat groups in May, as the suspects were using code words to peddle what were suspected to be drugs within chat groups.

After a month of investigation, police were able to identify the basic structure and major suspects within the drug trafficking group.

"The group mainly used online instant messaging tools to contact each other, and the transactions were conducted on third-party platforms.

The illegal drugs "were concealed as tea to be transported through package orders during the trafficking and sales process", the police said.

Police captured five suspects in the case in Weifang, Shandong province and Suifenhe and Mudanjiang, Heilongjiang province, in late June. They later captured another eight suspects between July and late October.

On Oct 23, the police captured eight suspects in Nanning and Hechi, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, who were alleged to have been growing and selling marijuana.

They also destroyed more than 20 greenhouses used for growing marijuana and confiscated more than 130 kilograms of finished marijuana and another 20 kg of semi-manufactured products.

Police also confiscated more than 4,000 fresh marijuana plants.

The kingpin of the drug trafficking group is a 31-year-old man who holds a graduate degree from a prestigious university in China, police said.

He had been a probationary teacher at several middle schools in his hometown before making his first fortune through reselling drugs in an online chat group.

He addressed himself as "the professor" inside chat groups, and allegedly sold a total of 10 kg of drugs before being captured.

Liu Yuejin, assistant to the minister of public security, said in a previous interview that most of the country's drug addicts are under 35 years old.

In 2014, about 463,000 people started using illegal drugs, and 80 percent of them abused synthetic drugs, he said.