Police have revealed details of how they smashed a
million-dollar counterfeiting ring in the southern Chinese city of
Zhuhai, raiding a fake money plant and rounding up seven
suspects.
The raid in mid July netted finished and partially finished
counterfeit notes with a face value of 26 million yuan (US$3.5
million), Zhuhai Municipal Public Security Bureau in Guangdong
Province said in a press release Tuesday.
It said the fake bills were all 20-yuan notes printed so well
that they could have passed easily as genuine.
The fake money had been handed to the Zhuhai branch of the
People's Bank of China and the suspects had been brought to the
local procurators office, it said.
In early July, police in Guangdong Province became so suspicious
of two Zhuhai-based businessmen, surnamed Zhu and Zhang, who were
running a secluded printing house in Fuxi village of Xiangzhou
District, a downtown industrial zone, that they launched 24-hour
surveillance.
The two men confessed to the police they had been talked into
printing fake bills for two illegal dealers at the 80-square meter
workshop.
Zhu and Zhang also confessed to police they had travelled to
Guangzhou to learn counterfeiting techniques, and had bought four
printing machines and hired three workers for the illegal
production.
They had counterfeited only 20-yuan bills, fearing notes of
bigger face value would be too noticeable, said a spokesman with
the Zhuhai Public Security Bureau.
He said it was the first banknote counterfeiting ring cracked in
Zhuhai in 30 years.
Zhuhai, which neighbors Macao, is one of the special economic
zones set up in 1979 to pilot China's economic reform. It has a
population of 1.88 million as of July.
(Xinhua News Agency November 7, 2007)