New system for protection of whistle-blowers

According to the Supreme People’s Prosecution Office, 60 percent of nearly 200,000 cases it handles each year originate from tip-offs by members of the public, China Daily reported.

But due to the lack of protection for whistle-blowers under Chinese law, many people who identify and expose incidents of crime and graft suffer retaliation from people they report on — who are mostly corrupt officials.

The number of whistle-blowers killed or seriously injured each year has increased from less than 500 in the 1990s to more than 1,200 in recent years, China Daily said.

New measures to be introduced by year’s end will include setting up a centralized national reporting network on the Internet and a free national telephone hotline, it said.

The identity of whistle-blowers will be better protected in the database as top prosecution authorities will be able to first gather information before ordering lower authorities to investigate, it said.

In a high-profile case reported by state media, a tax bureau worker reported corruption at her local tax administration but ended up being threatened, beaten and detained in a labor camp for a year.

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