Police have seized 118 million yuan (US$17 million) in fake bank notes since the start of a campaign to fight counterfeiting, China Police Daily reported yesterday.

A police officer teaches citizens how to detect fake bank notes in Zhenjiang, Jiangsu Province, on Feb 24. [China Daily]

"The battle against fake notes has started brilliantly," Liu Jinguo, vice-minister of public security, said on Monday.

Since the launch of an operation on Jan 20, police have handled 130 cases and arrested 312 people, he said.

The ministry has focused its efforts on Guangdong, Henan, Anhui, Guangxi and Fujian, but has also sent teams to Shenzhen and Zhuhai to work with officials from Hong Kong and Macao, he said.

Counterfeiters do damage to the country's financial order and economic security, and upset social stability, he said.

While Liu is confident of cracking the crime, Jiang Yong, director of the Center for Economic Security Studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, said police are facing a "big challenge" to fight financial crime because of their lack of experience.

"They are ill-equipped to deal with sophisticated and well-organized crime gangs," he said.

"More government bodies, not just the public security ministry, should get involved in fighting this sort of crime," he said.

Since the early 1990s, overseas-based counterfeiters have fed more than 300 million yuan in fake notes into the mainland economy, news magazine Insight China reported yesterday.

Since the end of last year, fake bank notes starting with the serial number HD90 have turned up in 10 provinces and regions. Other fake notes, with serial numbers beginning with TJ38 were also found recently in Haikou, Hainan Province.

The central bank said last month that the fake notes are always detected by ATMs and the note detectors used in branches, so people should not have any concerns about banking security.

(China Daily March 4, 2009)