Border police from China and Japan jointly smashed an organized illegal immigration operation on October 14 involving 91 Chinese stowaways.

Three "snakeheads",-- two Japanese and one Chinese, and five Chinese crew members on a Japanese ferry ship -- were arrested by the Japanese police.

Snakehead is a nickname for criminals who organize and transport illegal immigrants.

All the 91 stowaways come from East China's Fujian Province.

Chinese border police carried out emergency inspections along the coastline of Fujian Province after receiving a notice from Japan.

Another four Chinese suspects in this illegal immigration case were caught later, according to Xinhua News Agency.

China will carry out active co-operation with other countries in the control of illegal group immigration, said a Chinese authority.

Border police in the eastern coastal province of Fujian have arrested a total of 160 snakeheads over the past five months.

Police from Fujian investigated 18 cases in the same period.

Early this month, 25 Chinese citizens, stowaways en route to the Republic of Korea, died in the freezing hold of a fishing boat and their bodies were dumped into the sea.

(China Daily October 26, 2001)