Pocuratorial organs will continue to crack down on gang-related and economic crimes to create a sound environment for the country's economic and social development, a procuratorial official told the National People's Congress (NPC) yesterday.

"In an effort to maintain social stability, we'll continue to combat crimes that seriously threaten public security," Jia Chunwang, procurator-general of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP), said yesterday while delivering a work report to the NPC.

Gang-related and other serious crimes like murder, rape and arson are at the top of the crackdown list, Jia said.

Economic crimes like the infringement of intellectual property rights and damaging the environment and natural resources also fall within the scope of the crackdown.

Given the recent decision by the country's top court to take back the right to review all death sentences in the country from local courts, Jia said prosecutors had been ordered to strictly follow rules on evidence and procedure and refer death sentences to the Supreme People's Court for appeal.

But he noted that further retraining and rewriting of procedures was still necessary.

Jia also noted that problems remain in the work of procuratorial organs.

"Procuratorial organs did not fully exercise their supervisory powers, while some problems concerning unfair law enforcement remained unsettled," he said.

China Daily-Xinhua

(China Daily 03/14/2007 page6)