Hong Kong police fear prostitute influx after Dongguan vice crackdown

Hong Kong's sex trade - and the criminal syndicates that control it - are set to become public enemy No1 as fears grow that the city will fill the vice vacuum left after a huge crackdown on prostitution in Dongguan .

Some 50 billion yuan (HK$63.5 billion) is estimated to be at stake in lost revenue after 6,000 police raided nearly 2,000 entertainment venues last week in Dongguan and detained more than 900 people - with 10 senior police officers suspended from duty or penalised in the process - Xinhua said.

Yesterday, Commissioner of Police Andy Tsang Wai-hung said as a result of the raids, police in Hong Kong would be increasing operations against vice establishments. "To prevent [the sex trade] from proliferating [in Hong Kong], we have stepped up our operations against the sex trade recently," he said after a radio interview.

Tsang added that the police would continue to work with the authorities in Guangdong as they continue their crackdown in Dongguan, a city of 8.2 million people between Shenzhen and Guangzhou.

A senior Hong Kong police officer said Tsang's directive was warranted given the established links between Hong Kong and its neighbours across the border.

"There is definitely potential for the sex trade to suddenly grow quickly here but it won't just be confined to a rise in prostitution," the officer said. "It will bring with it all the usual vice that goes with it: narcotics, money laundering, triad protection."