Beijing police say they have wiped out drug-related crime at entertainment venues and have set a goal of eradicating drugs at all public places before the Olympic Games.

Fu Zhenghua, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau, said that after "waging a people's war against drug crime" this year, police had eliminated drugs at all of the city's 1,300 entertainment venues this year.

"This is a hard-earned success for such a large metropolis like Beijing, and we are very proud," Fu said.

"But this is just a preliminary success in the campaign against drugs. We hope to clear up all the city's public places by 2008," he added.

Police shut down two entertainment venues where drugs were being used and another 11 were temporarily suspended from doing business.

In the first 11 months of this year, police solved 3,620 drug-related crimes, seizing 4,065 suspects, of which 1,080 were involved in drug-trading. The number of cases represented a year-on-year increase of 12.8 per cent, said Zhao Wenzhong, section chief of the bureau's anti-drugs section.

Police arrested 24 foreigners in cases involving drugs this year, he added.

Zhao said police had met their goal by relying on "grinding" checks and secret inspections.

"We also introduced a tip-off system for the public to use, a blacklist for the entertainment venues and an appraisal system for policemen," Zhao said.

Police encouraged people to report cases of drug-use. Zhao said people who reported actual cases of drug-use would be amply rewarded.

Twenty-one people received a reward worth 170,000 yuan (US$21,250) this year, he said.

Entertainment venues where drugs were taken or sold would be blacklisted and exposed via the media, he said.

People caught taking drugs or otherwise connected to drug-use will not be allowed to operate or work for entertainment venues.

Besides applying stricter oversight to entertainment venues, police will also be reprimanded if they fail to stamp out drug-related crime within their precincts.

(China Daily 12/26/2006 page3)