China

Vice dens will be raided regularly

By Wang Huazhong (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-12-13 07:59

Entertainment venues targeted in crackdown on prostitution

Beijing - Police across the country are being urged to step up their crackdown on vice, with weekly checks on entertainment venues after a nation-wide campaign launched in June reduced prostitution and obscene performances at such venues.

Cross-regional police deployment and more undercover investigations will become constant, Liu Shaowu, director of the security management bureau under the Ministry of Public Security, said at a meeting on Saturday.

He said the frequency of regular and undercover investigations must be "no less than once a week" to maintain pressure on pornography-related crimes at entertainment venues, a report in Beijing News said on Sunday.

To guarantee effective and independent investigations, Liu said police from other regions will join local forces to conduct not only routine checks but also surprise raids.

Liu said efforts must be made to educate and rehabilitate women involved in prostitution and obscene performance cases.

"These women are usually called prostitutes, but I think we can now call them 'women who take a wrong step in life'. They need respect, too," he was quoted as saying.

Since the ministry began its campaign against obscene and sex-related crimes, the number of prostitution and obscene performance cases at entertainment venues has declined.

In October for example, an 18.4 percent drop was recorded in the number of such cases compared to September, according to a document released on the ministry's website on Sunday.

The campaign not only attached increased importance to the investigation and punishment of those who organize prostitution, but also targeted business operators and the "protective umbrellas" - sometimes local government officials - that allow prostitution to happen, the document said.

The document said the ministry sent 27 groups of inspectors to 651 entertainment business venues in four municipalities and 20 provinces during the campaign. At 381 of the venues, cases of prostitution or obscene performance were discovered.

In July, the ministry sent 10 inspection groups to seven cities in Jilin, Guangdong, Hainan, Sichuan and Shaanxi provinces, as well as Shanghai, to raid 10 entertainment venues, resulting in the arrest of 370 people.

In the following three months, the ministry and local police solved 54 major cases, the document said.

"The scale (of the anti-pornography drive in Beijing) is unprecedented," Li Zhongyi, a senior police official with the Beijing municipal public security bureau, said on Saturday.

"In the past, only related divisions conducted the drive, but this time, multiple police forces, including criminal investigation divisions, participated in the campaign."

But he said no public power (administrative or judicial officials) was involved in supporting high-profile prostitution dens, such as the Passion Club, which was dismantled in May in Beijing.

The "protective umbrellas" are mainly organized gangs, he said.

Xinhua contributed to this story.

China Daily