Beijing’s graft-buster looks to Hong Kong for help with fugitive asset hunt
Remarks seen as suggesting mainland’s corruption watchdog has evidence officials transferring money through the city
A top anti-corruption official overseeing Beijing’s international manhunt for fugitive Chinese officials and executives called for more cooperation with Hong Kong authorities on Friday.
On the sidelines of the National People’s Congress in Beijing, Liu Jianchao, the new director of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection’s International Cooperation Bureau, said Hong Kong’s Independent Commission Against Corruption had “accumulated a wealth of experience in governance over a long time, and we have many exchanges over this”.
“We also have worked together to crack down on cross-border crime and I think we have potential [for more] on this.”
READ MORE: Hong Kong’s ICAC steps up cooperation with mainland Chinese anti-graft counterparts
Liu did not give details on the bureau’s cooperation with the ICAC but said such joint efforts had been carried out and dealt with on a case-by-case basis.
Liu also did not say how many corrupt officials had channelled illicit funds abroad via Hong Kong, admitting only that “there were many channels and ways”.
Liu said it was hard to say whether Hong Kong was a major conduit for targeted fugitives to move assets offshore because data was needed to gauge such a claim.
“It’s easier to check through which channels they [physically] fled,” Liu said. “But we all know that the financial system is very complicated … and some [transferred their money] through underground banks, some through laundering, and some changed their names.”