China's Ministry of Public Security announced on Monday a significant decrease in crime rates over the past five years, highlighting improvements in public security and successful measures against violent crimes, economic offenses, and cybercrimes.
"In 2023, the number of criminal and security cases handled by public security agencies across the nation fell by 12.9 percent and 9.7 percent, respectively, compared to 2019. Serious violent criminal cases, including explosions and murders, saw a decrease of 10.7 percent. The homicide rate now stands at 0.46 per 100,000 people, positioning China among the nations with the lowest rates of homicide, gun-related incidents, and overall crime globally," said Li Guozhong, spokesperson for the ministry.
Over the past five years, public security agencies have enhanced mechanisms to prevent economic crimes and financial risks, solving nearly 400,000 economic crime cases and recovering over 230 billion yuan (nearly 32 billion U.S. dollars) in direct economic losses.
"The ongoing 'Clean the Internet' and 'Protect the Internet' initiatives continue to aggressively target ten major categories of cybercrimes, including breaches of personal information, the spread of online rumors, cyberbullying, paid internet trolling, and operations in the black and grey markets. To date, these efforts have led to the investigation of 453,000 cases of cybercrime," said Li.
Public security agencies have consistently advanced the campaign against organized crimes, dismantling over 5,200 criminal organizations and capturing more than 1,600 fugitives both domestically and internationally over the past five years.
The current homicide case resolution rate nationwide is 99.94 percent, the highest in history.
"In 2023, filings for theft, robbery, and fraud cases have decreased by 31.4 percent since 2019, while human trafficking cases have dropped by 66.6 percent. The ongoing 'Kunlun' operation has successfully resolved 354,000 criminal cases concerning food, drug, environment and intellectual property," said Li.
China sees significant crime rate drop over past five years
