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New Zealand returns fugitive's assets to China

Xinhua, May 10, 2017 Adjust font size:

New Zealand has returned the illegal gains of former fugitive Yan Yongming to China, according to Chinese police.

Auckland District Court on Wednesday imposed a sentence of five months home detention on Yan, also known as William Yan, for money laundering.

Before that, 27.8 million NZ dollars (about 19 million U.S. dollars) of Yan's assets had been returned to China, said a statement from China's Ministry of Public Security (MPS) on Wednesday.

Yan, former chairman of the pharmaceutical company Tonghua Golden-horse in northeast China's Jilin Province, had been in hiding in Australia and New Zealand since November 2001.

He was number five on China's top 100 fugitives listed in an Interpol "red notice" before returned to China on Nov. 12, 2016 to turn himself in.

Yan was sentenced to three years in prison with a three-year reprieve for embezzlement on Dec. 22, 2016. His illegal gains were also confiscated.

Given the fact that the New Zealand side had already charged Yan with money laundering before his return, Chinese police transferred him to New Zealand on Jan. 12, 2017 to stand trial there, said the statement.

So far, 40 fugitives on the Interpol red list have either voluntarily returned or been extradited to China, according to the MPS. Endi