Chinese police detain pyramid selling suspects

Chinese police detained 8,734 people suspected of involvement in a type of illegal direct sales known as pyramid selling, in the first nine months of the year, a Chinese public security ministry officer said Wednesday.

Gao Feng, chief of Economic Investigation of the Ministry of Public Security, told reporters that the suspects were detained during a nationwide campaign by police against pyramid sales.

The police dealt successfully with 1,418 out of 1,499 pyramid sales cases reported, involving 5.16 billion yuan (640 million U.S. dollars) worth of goods, said the officer.

The police froze 285 million yuan of assets used by the suspects.

The country's industrial and business regulator said it handled a total of 3,377 cases of pyramid sales during the first 10 months of this year. 536,067 people were questioned, and 1,553 of them handed over to the police for criminal investigation.

Zhong Youping, deputy director of the State Administration for Industry and Commerce, said the administration and the Ministry of Public Security had created a mechanism to exchange information about pyramid sales, and publicized its phone numbers and email addresses so the public could report illegal activities.

The regulator said it would crack down on pyramid selling on the Internet.

Source: Xinhua