11/10/2009 Source: www.chinaview.cn

The series of high-profile organized crime trials in southwest China’s Chongqing Municipality have proved just the tip of the iceberg in a nationwide battle against crime gangs.

On Monday, southwest China’s Guizhou Province, published 10 e-mail addresses for the public to report gang-related crimes on the website of its public security department.

Guizhou police dealt with at least seven gang crime cases within 20 days in an intensive crackdown last month.

Police in Hunan Province, in central China, was also reported to have broken up three major criminal gangs in its Xiangxi prefecture this year.

Across Hunan, 73 officials were found to have shielded or been directly engaged in gang-related crimes.

Other provinces such as Gansu and Anhui were also intensifying the fight against organized crime gangs.

China’s police launched a long-term campaign against criminal gangs in 2006. As of September, more than 1,200 cases of gang crimes have been dealt with across the country, with more than 13,000 criminal gangs broken up and at least 89,000 people arrested.

The revelations of police officials in collusion with criminals in Chongqing Municipality that started in June have heightened coverage of the campaign.

Chongqing Mayor Wang Hongju revealed on Sunday that at least 200 local judicatory officials had been found to be involved in organized crimes.

Wen Qiang, former deputy director of Chongqing’s public security department, was found to have shielded criminal gangs and committed other crimes while holding his post.

Wen will be prosecuted later this month in connection with the offences of rape, money laundering, disguising or concealing the proceeds of crime, illegally holding firearms, offering loans at high interest, forging official and corporate seals, introducing women to prostitution and taking bribes.

Wen’s sister-in-law, organized crime boss Xie Caiping, was sentenced to 18 years in prison after a first-instance trial last week.

Xie, labeled the “godmother of the underworld” in Chongqing, was convicted of organizing and leading a criminal organization, running gambling dens, illegal imprisonment, harboring people taking illegal narcotics and giving bribes to officials.

Another 21 people in Xie’s case, including officials who offered protection to gang members, were given jail terms ranging from one to 13 years in sentences handed down at the Chongqing No.5 Intermediate People’s Court.

Chongqing’s procuratorate has issued arrest warrants for more than 800 suspects in the municipality’s crackdown on gang-related crimes, and more than 320 people have been prosecuted so far.

At least 52 local officials have been investigated or punished for shielding criminal gangs in Chongqing.

Zhou Yongkang, member of the Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China Central Committee Political Bureau, pledged in late October that the campaign would continue until criminal gangs were eradicated.

Zhou urged a relentless investigation of any official providing a “protective umbrella” for organized crime.

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