THEY take a dim view of tax fraud in China not bothering with niceties such as warning letters from the Revenue Commissioners or working out interest and penalties. Among 16 convicts executed early this month in the southern Chinese boom town of Shenzhen was a businessman convicted of pocketing 1.32 million yuan (about £100,000) through export tax fraud.

Another executive in the same tax case was sentenced to death but granted a two-year reprieve, while a businessman from Hong Kong was imprisoned for life in a separate but similar case, the official Xinhua news agency reported. Long prison terms were meted out in a third case.