Guangzhou, capital of China's richest province of Guangdong, plans to install an additional 250,000 video cameras across the city this year to enhance public security, local authorities said.

"The surveillance cameras will be set up in public places such as parking lots and hotels as part of a three-billion-yuan project to curb crimes through the use of advanced technology," said Zhang Jieming, head of the city's Finance Bureau, in a draft budget report to the local people's congress.

"The government will shell out 205 million yuan (US$26.3 million), and businesses and institutions where the cameras are installed will chip in nearly 2.8 billion yuan (US$359.4 million)," he said.

Guangzhou already has more than 90,000 surveillance cameras around the city that not only monitor traffic flows on major roads but also keep watch on squares, banks and shopping malls.

The city government spent five million yuan installing cameras on major roads last year and recently announced that it would install more than 24,000 cameras on buses by the end of this year.

But critics say that the move may invade people's privacy.

A city of about ten million registered residents and more than three million migrant people, Guangzhou has a high rate of burglary, robbery and theft.

(Xinhua News Agency January 25, 2007)