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10 Drug Dealers Get Death Penalty
China executed 10 drug trafficking criminals nationwide Monday, according to the Supreme People's Court (SPC).
Another 15 criminals involved in the three cases made public by the SPC Monday have received sentences varying from prison terms to suspended death sentences.
"The courts will effectively curb drug-related crimes with severe legal measures to guarantee that the life and property rights of the public will not be violated,'' said SPC Vice-President Liu Jiachen yesterday during the International Day for Narcotic Control.
Liu pledged courts would use an iron hand on criminals who manufacture, smuggle and sell narcotics.
In one of the three cases, a court in South China's Fujian Province found that farmer Gong Jianzhu collaborated with a Taiwanese and a Hong Kong businessman to smuggle more than 115 kilograms of heroin from Guangdong and Fujian to Taiwan.
In another case, Zhang Jinfu and Zhou Weijun, two farmers from Southwest China's Yunnan Province were caught with 76 kilograms of heroin when entering Yunnan from Myanmar.
Lin Weijun, Yang Huicheng, Lin Junqiang and Lu Hui were found guilty of manufacturing the meth-amphetamine "ice'' in Guangdong Province. The police found a total of 1,500 kilograms of ice and 1,500 grams of material for the manufacture of the drug in the factory.
According to China's Criminal Law, trafficking of more than 50 grams of heroin or more than 1,000 grams of opium can receive death penalty.
Statistics from the General Administration of Customs indicate that as of yesterday, custom offices across China have uncovered 56 drug smuggling cases, seizing a total of 234 kilograms of heroin, opium and meth-amphetamine, 27 per cent more than the previous year.
Customs also seized 30 kilograms of Ecstasy, a powerful hallucinatory drug, and more than 10 tons of chemicals used to make the drugs.
The government conducted a series of educational programmes across the country to raise public awareness of the dangers of drug abuse.
Experts from the National Institute on Drug Dependence along with Beijing University provided consultation to people in Beijing on Sunday.
In South China's Humen, Guangdong, where China's national hero Lin Zexu (1775-1850) burned thousands of boxes of opium 160 years ago, 200 kilograms of heroin and 200 kilograms of meth-amphetamine were burned Monday.
The anti-drug activities in Guangdong included publicly sentencing a group of drug dealers and public shows on the destruction caused by drug abuse.
"To curb the rise of drug crimes, we will strengthen our anti-drug efforts in the coming months,'' said Zheng Dong, an official from the Guangdong Public Security Bureau.
Because of its proximity to Myanmar and other Southeast Asian countries, Zheng said, Guangdong is facing an increase in drug crimes as it opens increasingly wider to the outside.
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