More than 300 visitors attended the opening ceremony of the show Monday, which reveals details of the Xiamen Yuanhua group's massive smuggling operation between 1996 and 1999.

Lessons should be learned from the case, according to He Yong, supervision minister and Mu Xinsheng, director of the General Administration of Customs.

The smuggling ring, led by Lai Changxing, 43, was cracked last month. Fourteen people, including officials at provincial level, were sentenced to death according to criminal law.

The office building of the Xiamen Yuanhua Group has become the venue of the show.

The seven-storey building, decorated with a red mosaic, was a famous place in Xiamen with its guests including dozens of high-ranking government officials.

"The 'red building' was the place where leaders of the Yuanhua Group hatched plots for smuggling and bribing top government officials,'' states the introduction to the show.

With luxurious eatery, ballrooms, karaoke bars, saunas, cinemas and bedrooms, the 'red building' can be said to be a top-level hotel where dozens of high-ranking officials resigned themselves to degeneracy and become tools of Lai's group.

Investigations revealed that from 1996 to 1999, Lai and other suspects smuggled goods worth 53 billion yuan (US$6.38 billion). The evaded tax totalled 30 billion yuan (US$3.6 billion).

More than 600 people were involved in the illegal activities. Some 200 suspects who had fled the area have been caught. To date nearly 300 suspects have been put on trial.

It took a team of investigators almost two years to smash the ring and for the criminals to be punished by law.

(China Daily 08/28/2001)