HONG KONG | Survey: over 60 pct support constitutional reform package

More than 60 percent of Hong Kong people support the government’s constitutional reform package, Hong Kong’s largest political party announced yesterday. The survey, released by the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), also showed that 32 percent of respondents oppose the reform package. Some 1,070 people were questioned for the poll. More than 80 percent of them think lawmakers should vote in accordance with public opinions. The DAB’s vice chairman, Horace Cheung, urged at the press conference that pan-democratic lawmakers respect the public’s wish to have universal suffrage in 2017.

11 prostitution organizers jailed in Henan

Eleven people have been sentenced to prison terms ranging from ten years to life over organized prostitution in a nightclub in central China’s Henan Province between Aug. 2012 and Nov. 2013. Chen Jiagui and Wang Guofu, two managers from the Royal No.1 Nightclub in Zhengzhou, the provincial capital, were convicted of organizing sex trade and sentenced to life in prison, said the Xinxiang Intermediate People’s Court yesterday. Chen was also found guilty of illegally selling cigarettes of top domestic brands to make profits. Chen and Wang’s personal assets have been confiscated. Nine other defendants received sentences from ten to 15 years along with fines. The nightclub had employed more than 4,500 females in total before it was raided and forced to close on Nov. 1, 2013. The dossiers of 133 suspects were transferred to prosecutors in March last year, after a five-month investigation. The 11 defendants stood trial in February. No date has been set by four courts in Xinxiang City for the remaining verdicts. Eight police officers, including deputy head of the Zhengzhou Public Security Bureau Zhou Tingxin were implicated in the nightclub case. Zhou was later sentenced to six years for accepting bribes.