Chinese police had a better rate of success at cracking murder cases last year than either the United States or Britain, officials said on Monday, strongly slamming the remarks that forced confessions were behind the good results.

Wu Heping (L), spokesman of the Ministry of Public Security, speaks at the ministry's regular press conference as He Ting, chief of the ministry's criminal investigation department listens in Beijing May 16, 2006. [CIIC]

Of the more than 30,000 murder cases in China in 2005, almost 90 percent were solved, and the number of people murdered per 100,000 of the population was only just over 2, far less than the 5.6 figure in the United States, police officials said.

In the United States, 63 percent of murder cases were cracked, they said.

The credit was due to good police work under the slogan adopted in 2004 of "homicide cases must be broken," said He Ting, head of the public security ministry's criminal investigation department.

"The campaign has been greatly successful," He told a news conference. "It was due to the blood and sweat of a million police and security people."

In recent years, China has come under pressure not only from foreign rights groups and the United Nations but also an increasingly feisty domestic media to crack down on forced confessions and torture after several infamous cases.

Page:

1

2