Over 13,000 cultural relics recovered in first year of operation targeting thieves

Public security and cultural relics departments across China have resolved about 800 cultural relics cases in the past year and recovered over 13,000 cultural relics, the Ministry of Public Security said on Friday.

The authorities should continue to prioritize the recovery of stolen cultural relics in their efforts to combat such crimes, it added.

In October last year, the ministry and the National Cultural Heritage Administration launched a three-year nationwide operation to combat crimes involving cultural relics.

During the operation, the authorities have focused on the fight against the illegal excavation of ancient cultural sites, theft from ancient tombs, the theft of stone carvings from grotto temples, and theft and damage to revolutionary cultural relics. They have also closely monitored the underground cultural relics market and online trading platforms, the ministry said in a news release.

Since the operation began, the ministry has organized local law enforcement agencies to launch determined efforts to solve 38 major cultural relics cases, targeting the associated organizations, masterminds and criminal networks.

The ministry has organized special task forces in various regions to tackle long-unsolved cases related to the illegal excavation and theft of cultural relics. That has resulted in significant achievements, including the resolution by police in Xuzhou, Jiangsu province, of tomb-robbing cases dating back to 2004 and 2010 at a Han Dynasty tomb cluster.

In August, the ministry issued an A-level wanted list, the highest-profile arrest warrant in the country, for eight major cultural relics crime fugitives. Seven have since been captured and brought to justice.

Government departments and Party organs have introduced improvements to form a unified front against cultural relics crimes. In February, the Publicity Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the General Administration of Customs, and the National Cultural Heritage Administration jointly issued a Special Plan for Combating and Preventing Cultural Relics Crimes (2023-2025), furthering the protection of cultural relics.

In September, under the guidance of the Ministry of Public Security and the National Cultural Heritage Administration, a mini-program for reporting information about national cultural relics crimes was launched on WeChat.