This reporter learned from a press conference held by the Ministry of Public Security on 13 December that after more than a year of meticulous investigation and operation, the public security organs in Anhui Province have successfully cracked the Anqing "5.31" extraordinarily large theft and resale of cultural relics that was listed and supervised by the Ministry of Public Security, arrested 61 criminal suspects, cracked 78 cases of illegal excavation of ancient tombs and reselled cultural relics, and recovered 1,696 cultural relics of various types, including 1 second-level cultural relics and 89 third-level cultural relics, adding major achievements to the national special action to crack down on and prevent cultural relics crimes.
On May 31, 2020, the public security organs of Qianshan City, Anqing City, received reports from the masses about the theft of ancient tombs, and quickly dispatched the police. According to the appraisal of the cultural relics department, the stolen excavation site belongs to the ancient tomb group from the Warring States to the Song Dynasty, involving the site of Xuejiagang, a national key cultural relics protection unit. The Ministry of Public Security listed the case as a listed supervision case, and deployed the Criminal Police Corps of the Anhui Provincial Public Security Department to organize the investigation. The special case team went to 10 prefectures and cities in 5 provinces to carry out the first round of arrest operations, successively arrested 29 criminal suspects, and detected 49 cases of illegal excavation, resale, and concealment of criminal proceeds. Since then, after more than 5 months of in-depth digging and careful investigation, the true identity information of more than 30 criminal suspects of the two criminal gangs and the chain of cultural relics reselling and selling stolen goods involving neighboring provinces have been gradually clarified.
On July 22, 2021, under the organization and coordination of the Criminal Investigation Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security and the Criminal Police Corps of the Provincial Public Security Department, the special case team mobilized more than 130 police forces to carry out the second round of centralized network collection operations in Nanjing, Changzhou, Zhejiang, Shangluo, Shaanxi, Xuancheng, Qianshan and other places in Jiangsu Province, arresting all 29 major criminal suspects, seizing more than 400 suspected cultural relics and a large number of criminal tools, and further cracking more than 50 cases of cultural relics such as theft, excavation, and resale. At present, the case is being further handled. (Science and Technology Daily reporter He Liang; image courtesy of the Ministry of Public Security)
Source: Science and Technology Daily