China dealt with 10,992 commercial bribery cases involving 3.29 billion yuan (US$411 million) between August 2005 and September 2006, said a senior official with the Communist Party of China's (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.

"A total of 2,537 cases, which account for 23.1 percent of the total, involve civil servants," said He Yong, deputy secretary of the commission and head of the central government's anti-commercial bribery group.

He said 68 prefecture-level and 551 county-level government officials were found to be involved in cases in a campaign targeted at commercial bribery starting from last August.

"With fast economic growth, commercial bribery in various forms has become a big evil in China's economy and aroused intense public concern," He said.

He said the campaign to crack down on commercial bribery had focused on six major fields, including construction projects, land purchase, property transactions, medicine buying and selling, government procurement and exploitation of natural resources.

More attention will be paid to nine other fields, including bank loans, securities and futures, business insurance, publications, sports, telecommunications, electricity, quality control and environmental protection.

He said the efforts to crack down on commercial bribery have achieved remarkable results, but pointed out there is still a long way to go.

"More severe punishments will be imposed on civil servants involved in commercial bribery and the government is to strengthen supervision," said He.

He said the government wants the public to report more commercial bribery cases.

"By the end of this year, the central government's anti-commercial bribery group will hold another press conference to announce more prosecuted cases," He said.

Commercial bribery usually refers to bribes from companies and often involves a company paying money to government officials to gain special advantages.

"Commercial bribery obstructs healthy economic development and causes corruption among officials, reducing people's trust in the government," He said.

"In addition, production costs rise and social morals are damaged."

(China Daily December 1, 2006)