Summer Palace by the sea up for sale

Want to buy Tiananmen Square or the Summer Palace?

If so, you can purchase them at an auction in the eastern port city of Xiamen on September 16.

It is not the real thing, unfortunately, but a quarter-size copy, part of the 67-hectare Yuan Hua Film City outside Xiamen that will be sold as one of 13 properties belonging to alleged smuggling king Lai Changxing, who is in Canada fighting extradition to China.

Beijing accuses Lai and his Yuan Hua company of smuggling US$6 billion (HK$46.7 billion) worth of luxury goods, cars, oil, petrochemicals, electronics, steel, construction materials and other items into China in the mid-1990s, evading taxes totalling 30 billion yuan (HK$28.2 billion).

Lai invested 135 million yuan in the film city, which opened on January 1, 1999, with replicas of Tiananmen Square, the Summer Palace and other Ming and Qing dynasty buildings.

'During busy days, we get income of 100,000 yuan a day,' a film city official said yesterday. 'During off-peak days, we collect 10,000 yuan. It is a good business, employing 70 workers.'