Yahoo – AFP,
14 July 2014
The GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) facilities in Shanghai, China are shown July 25, 2013 (AFP) |
Prosecutors
in Shanghai have indicted two foreign investigators linked to drugmaker
GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), which is at the centre of a bribery scandal in China,
state media reported Monday.
British
national Peter Humphrey and his wife Yu Yingzeng, a US citizen, are charged
with illegally obtaining private information on Chinese citizens, the official
news agency Xinhua reported, citing unnamed prosecutor sources.
The case is
the first indictment by Chinese prosecutors against foreigners for illegal
investigation, the report said.
In other
cases, state media have cited legal experts saying the maximum penalty for
illegally obtaining and trading personal information is three years in prison.
The two
will be tried on August 7 in a closed session shut to relatives and diplomats,
a family friend who asked not to be identified told AFP earlier this month.
Prosecutors
told Xinhua that the couple illegally sold personal information including
details of household registrations, property and car ownership, call logs and
exit-entry records to multinational corporations in the country, including GSK
China.
Information
was either bought or obtained through means including secret photography or
infiltration, according to Xinhua.
Humphrey, a
veteran fraud investigator and former journalist for the news agency Reuters,
founded Shanghai-based risk advisory firm ChinaWhys in 2004, while Yu worked as
its general manager.
GSK hired
Humphrey to investigate the origin of a sex tape of Mark Reilly, the former
boss of its China division, Britain's Sunday Times newspaper has reported.
The
recording emerged just before Beijing launched a bribery probe into the
company.
Reilly was
accused of ordering employees to bribe hospitals, doctors and health
institutions to gain billions of dollars in revenue, Chinese authorities said
in May after a 10-month investigation.
China's
healthcare sector is widely considered to be riddled with graft, partly the
result of an opaque tendering system for drugs and doctors' low salaries.
The
government has since last year launched sweeping probes into alleged
malpractice by foreign companies in several sectors, including the
pharmaceutical and milk powder industries.
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