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Choi Chi-yuk

China is to launch a campaign against organised crime and government officials who shelter criminal organisations, the latest in a series of similar initiatives by the Communist Party over the decades.
The crackdown forms part of President Xi Jinping’s sweeping campaign against corruption in China since he took office six years ago.
Several politically driven “Strike Hard” campaigns against organised crime were pursued in China since the 1980s.
Xi Jinping puts China’s mafia in cross hairs, but fears of judicial abuse remain
These coincided with government efforts to emphasise the rule of law and to underline the party’s authority.
The campaigns were held in 1983, 1996, 2001 and 2010. There were also smaller scale anti-crime crackdowns peppered throughout the years.

1983: China’s first major crackdown on crime
Deng Xiaoping initiated the first major crackdown on crime in 1983 as he ushered in major economic reforms in the wake of the chaos of the Cultural Revolution the previous decade.
To the surprise of many, Deng also took on a prominent princeling – a term in China for the offspring of party revolutionary veterans – during the campaign as a public sign that nobody, however well connected, was above the law.
Zhu Guohua, the 25-year-old grandson of the senior general Zhu De was put to death for hooliganism, on the same day as more than 80 criminals.

1996 & 2001: Mafia-related crimes hit a peak
Another “Strike Hard” campaign was launched in 1996 as China’s economy boomed in the years following the start of Deng’s reform and opening policy, with crimes involving arms, drugs and mafia-style gangsters hitting a peak. The third round of the “Strike Hard” in 2001 targeted surging crimes rate across the country.

2010: High-profile murder cases prompt anti-crime campaign
The anti-crime campaign of 2010 followed several high-profile murder cases, including stabbings at kindergartens and primary schools earlier that year. Dozens of elderly or disabled people in Guangdong province had also been killed by crime gangs to sell their bodies in particularly notorious cases. The buyers were people who wanted their deceased loved ones to be buried, which was banned, and offered the other corpses for cremation in their place to mislead the authorities.
Other crime crackdowns have been held at a regional or provincial level, including in Chongqing under former city party chief Bo Xilai. He is now serving a life sentence for corruption.
China fast becoming Europe’s drug wholesaler, report warns
He initiated a massive crackdown on crime gangs in the huge south-western municipality in 2009.
Bo, along with his police chief Wang Lijun, detained nearly 5,000 people and more than 3 billion yuan (US$473 million) in assets were seized within 10 months starting from June 2009.
The crackdown was later severely criticised, amid cases of confessions made under torture and evidence that Bo was using the campaign to target political rivals.
Several provinces followed in targeting organised crime, with some analysts suggesting the initiatives triggered the nationwide “Strike Hard” organised by the public security ministry in 2010.






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Crime in China

Detentions, torture, executions: how China dealt with the mafia in the past

A file picture taken in Beijing in 1998 of 11 criminals paraded in handcuffs by police at a public sentencing rally outside a hotel. The convicted were caught while selling pornographic videos, robbing and stealing. The rally was part of China's ‘Strike Hard’ anti-crime campaign that began two years earlier. Photo: Associated Press

1983, more than 80 were executed in China during operation "Strike Hard". Photo: HANDOUT

Bombing suspect Jin Ruchao is shown in this image taken off China's Guangxi TV during his arrest in Beihai, southern coast city of China, on Friday, March 23, 2001. Jin, 40, was accused of causing four blasts on March 16 in Shijiazhuang, a northern industrial center, killing 108 people. (AP Photo/Guangxi TV)

This picture taken on August 22, 2013 and released by the Jinan Intermediate People's Court's Weibo account shows former Chinese political star Bo Xilai (C) standing on trial in the Intermediate People's Court in Jinan, east China's Shandong province. In the first picture of Bo Xilai for almost 18 months the fallen politician stands in stark contrast to the man who wore well-cut suits and confident demeanour before the murder, corruption and abuse of power scandal broke. Standing in the dock at the beginning of his trial, the once rising star of China's Communist party stood in an open-necked shirt looking pensive, slightly stooped and his hair trimmed and tinged with grey at the temples. Bo went on trial for bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power on August 22, a court said, in the country's highest-profile prosecution for decades. CHINA OUT AFP PHOTO / JINAN INTERMEDIATE PEOPLE'S COURT ----EDITORS NOTE---- RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / JINAN INTERMEDIAT

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China

Politics

President Xi Jinping’s latest campaign against serious crime is the latest in a series of Communist Party crackdowns on gangs, criminals and corrupt officials
