China catches 150 corruption suspects overseas since start of the year
Eight of the fugitives had been on the run for more than 10 years, according to a public security ministry official
China has repatriated 150 corruption suspects from 32 countries this year as the government’s crackdown on economic crimes intensifies.
Eight of the suspects had been on the run for more than 10 years and 44 were involved in cases relating to tens of millions of yuan, mainland media cited Gao Feng, the political commissar of the Public Security Ministry’s economic crimes bureau, as saying.
Operation Fox Hunt was launched by the government last year to trace suspects who had fled abroad, often taking large sums of money with them.
It forms part of a campaign led by President Xi Jinping to try to stamp out corruption.
However, one of the most notorious suspects, Dai Xuemin, was caught when he tried to sneak back into the country.
Dai, a former chief of securities sales at a state-owned trust company that was closed by the People’s Bank of China in 2002, was the first of the 150 suspects to be caught. He fled overseas in 2001.
He was caught in China on April 25 after police were tipped off that he had returned to country with a foreign passport, Xinhua reported.
