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Friday, 23 October 2009
New gangs have emerged
Triads in China began life as secret societies organised to unseat the last imperial dynasty, but they later moved into criminal activities and flourished in pre-communist China.
Triads in China began life as secret societies organised to unseat the last imperial dynasty, but they later moved into criminal activities and flourished in pre-communist China.
Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek formed close ties with triads in Shanghai, and many fled with him when the communists seized power in 1949. Others went to Hong Kong to escape a crackdown on opium and vice.
Gangs were almost completely eradicated during the first decades of communist rule. But over the past 30 years, the economic boom set in motion by free-market reforms has forced the Communist Party to withdraw from many areas it formerly controlled.
This has cleared the way for new gangs to emerge and conspire with officials who wield bureaucratic power but are poorly paid. In the 1980s, gangsters started out in traditional rackets - drug trafficking, smuggling of luxury cars and extortion.
As China’s economy evolved, they moved on to loan-sharking, evicting tenants from land marked for real estate development, and other rackets.
In central Henan province, gangs run beer-supply networks. In south-western Chengdu, they steal medicine and resell it.
In northern Hebei province, nearly 100 gangsters put on trial last month were involved in businesses ranging from entertainment to seafood wholesaling and parking; 10 were sentenced to death.
Tax reform in the mid-1990s sent revenue to Beijing at the expense of local governments, making local officials and police eager to cash in on money-making opportunities offered by gangs.
Gangsters are often hired as muscle to settle disputes.
Madam Huang Guobi, a farmer, said her husband was killed when seven gang members broke into their house and attacked him over a land dispute. He was stabbed more than 20 times; she suffered 10 stab wounds, she said. ‘We screamed for help but nobody came. All the villagers know those people are gangsters. They gamble, steal or rob all the time.’
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New gangs have emerged
Triads in China began life as secret societies organised to unseat the last imperial dynasty, but they later moved into criminal activities and flourished in pre-communist China.
Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek formed close ties with triads in Shanghai, and many fled with him when the communists seized power in 1949. Others went to Hong Kong to escape a crackdown on opium and vice.
Gangs were almost completely eradicated during the first decades of communist rule. But over the past 30 years, the economic boom set in motion by free-market reforms has forced the Communist Party to withdraw from many areas it formerly controlled.
This has cleared the way for new gangs to emerge and conspire with officials who wield bureaucratic power but are poorly paid. In the 1980s, gangsters started out in traditional rackets - drug trafficking, smuggling of luxury cars and extortion.
As China’s economy evolved, they moved on to loan-sharking, evicting tenants from land marked for real estate development, and other rackets.
In central Henan province, gangs run beer-supply networks. In south-western Chengdu, they steal medicine and resell it.
In northern Hebei province, nearly 100 gangsters put on trial last month were involved in businesses ranging from entertainment to seafood wholesaling and parking; 10 were sentenced to death.
Tax reform in the mid-1990s sent revenue to Beijing at the expense of local governments, making local officials and police eager to cash in on money-making opportunities offered by gangs.
Gangsters are often hired as muscle to settle disputes.
Madam Huang Guobi, a farmer, said her husband was killed when seven gang members broke into their house and attacked him over a land dispute. He was stabbed more than 20 times; she suffered 10 stab wounds, she said. ‘We screamed for help but nobody came. All the villagers know those people are gangsters. They gamble, steal or rob all the time.’
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