Amendment VII to the Criminal Law

Amendment VII to the Criminal Law was adopted at the 7th Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Eleventh National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on February 28, 2009.

Highlights:

1. Whoever smuggles rare plants or their products or any other goods or articles that are prohibited by the state from being imported or exported shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than five years or criminal detention, and be fined, or shall only be fined;

2. Whoever has inside information on securities or futures transactions or illegally obtains inside information on securities or futures transactions, and prior to the release of the information that involves the issuance of securities or futures transactions or other information that has a material effect on the transaction price of securities or futures, buys or sells the said securities, engages in the futures transaction related to the inside information, leaks the said information, or explicitly or implicitly advises others to engage in the aforesaid transaction activities shall, if the circumstances are serious, be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 5 years or criminal detention, and/or be fined 1 to 5 times the illegal gains;

3. Whoever organizes or leads pyramid selling activities to cheat the participants of property and disturb the economic and social order, in which, in the name of marketing commodities, providing services or any other business operation, the participants are required to obtain qualification for participation by paying fees, purchasing commodities or services or by any other means, and in which the participants are classified into different levels according to a certain order, the calculation of remuneration to participants is directly or indirectly dependent on the number of persons recruited, and the participants are induced to continue or coerced into continuing recruiting others to participate, shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 5 years or criminal detention, and be fined;

4. Where the property or expenditure of any state functionary obviously significantly exceeds his legitimate income, he shall be ordered to explain the sources. If he fails to do so, the difference shall be determined as illegal income, and he shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 5 years or criminal detention; or if the difference is extremely large shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of not less than five years but not more than ten years.

Amendment VIII to the Criminal Law

Amendment VIII to the Criminal Law was adopted at the 19th Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Eleventh National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on February 25, 2011.

Highlights:

1. A person attaining the age of 75 may be given a lighter or mitigated penalty if he commits an intentional crime; or shall be given a lighter or mitigated penalty if he commits a negligent crime. The death penalty shall not be given to a person attaining the age of 75 at the time of trial, unless he has caused the death of another person by especially cruel means.

2. Where a person is sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve, if he does not commit any intentional crime during the period of reprieve, the sentence shall be commuted to life imprisonment upon expiration of the two-year period; if he has any major meritorious performance, the sentence shall be commuted to imprisonment of 25 years upon expiration of the two-year period; or if it is verified that he has committed any intentional crime, the death penalty shall be executed with the approval of the Supreme People's Court.

3. A State functionary who, while discharging official duties at home or abroad defects to another country, shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 5 years, criminal detention, public surveillance or deprivation of political rights.

4. Whoever manufactures or sells fake drugs or food that fails to meet food safety standards shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 3 years or criminal detention, and be concurrently given a fine. Whoever mixes the food to be produced or sold with toxic or harmful non-food raw materials shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 5 years and be concurrently fined.

5. Whoever buys or sells commodities by violence or intimidation, or compels another person to provide or receive services, if the circumstances are grave, shall be sentenced to a fixed-term imprisonment of no more than 3 years or criminal detention and be concurrently or separately fined.

Amendment IX to the Criminal Law

Amendment IX to the Criminal Law, as adopted at the 16th Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Twelfth National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China on August 29, 2015, is hereby issued, and has come into force on November 1, 2015.