Human trafficking ring smashed in Spain and France, gang of smuggling of Chinese nationals to the United States and Europe

MADRID - The Government of Spain said that a joint investigation by French and Spanish police has broken a gang that allegedly was Chinese smuggling in Europe and United States citizens.

The Ministry of the Interior said on Saturday that 75 people have been detained, 51 in Spain and 24 in France, including two suspected heads based in Barcelona from the Organization in Europe.

The gang allegedly charged up to 50,000 euros ($66.700) for the transport of Chinese citizens to the U.S., Great Britain, Spain, France, Greece, Italy and Turkey.

Some of the trafficked people ended up in the sex trade, said the Ministry.

European hub of the band was from Barcelona Airport. It supposedly was the city of the Northeast as a stopping point for Chinese while false documents were prepared.

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Lei Zhengfu Sex Tape: Chinese Official Says He's A Lecher, But No Crook

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BEIJING -- Call me a lecher but don't call me a crook, an ex-city official at the heart of a sex tape scandal has said in his unusually spirited courtroom defense against corruption charges.

The case of Lei Zhengfu, former party chief of a district in the southern city of Chongqing, has riveted the Chinese public since video clips went viral of the portly 55-year-old having sex with a woman hired by property developers allegedly in an elaborate extortion scheme.

In a country where corruption trials of high-level officials typically look like the scripted outcome of backdoor bargaining, Lei's case has offered a rare look at what happens when a lower-level official is caught in a high-profile crackdown – with few political cards to play.

Lei is accused of accepting more than 3 million yuan ($500,000) in bribes from a developer to pay off a businessman who was allegedly using the tape to blackmail him. Lei rejects the charge of bribery, saying the money was a loan.

"Although I'm quite lecherous, I'm not greedy for money," he said in a Chongqing court Wednesday, reading out a personal statement.

Public anger and disgust over official corruption found an easy target in the images of his jowly, pop-eyed face in the throes of passion. Lei was soon fired from his post, and in ensuing weeks, more tapes were found, felling 11 other Chongqing officials.

The scandal has exposed in lurid detail the shady intertwining of sex, business and politics in Chinese society at a time when a newly installed generation of Communist Party leadership has vowed to crack down on widespread graft. It also tapped into public outrage over what is seen as the moral degradation of the country's leaders.

"The people's hatred of official corruption is not only because of their illegal behavior but because of resentment that they enjoy a special status that is higher than others and lets them enjoy more social resources," said Liu Shanying, a politics researcher at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing. "They hope to see them punished by the law, which would help them vent that anger."

The court said it would issue a verdict at a later, unspecified date. On Thursday, those accused of running the extortion ring stood trial in a closed hearing.

Wednesday's proceedings involving Lei were in stark contrast to the corruption trial of China's former railways minister Liu Zhijun earlier this month, a much bigger case involving bribery amounting to 64 million yuan ($10.5 million) spanning more than two decades.

The railways minister's trial was a smoothly orchestrated affair of just a few hours, concluding before lunchtime. He pleaded guilty and showed remorse, thanking the Communist Party for the years it invested in him. Only the official Xinhua News Agency and state broadcaster CCTV were allowed inside the courtroom and media reports were uniformly similar and lacking in the salacious detail that has featured in Lei's case.

The trials of high-level officials accused of corruption are often seen as foregone conclusions hammered out by politicians and the party's graft investigators and announced by a court. There is usually little dispute aired during proceedings, and most of it is kept out of the public eye. In the railways minister's case, the two sides were so in tandem that even prosecutors were making a case for the court to show leniency for Liu.

As a district party chief, Lei is probably at the lowest rung of the party ladder in terms of officials who matter – and his case comes during a big political shakeup in the city of Chongqing after the downfall of its party chief in a major scandal. Lei appears to have been left to fend for himself and has sought to make the case that he was the victim of a heinous extortion gang that preyed on his weakness for women who were not his wife.

Here's how the scheme that allegedly ensnared Lei and the other officials is said to have worked: Attractive women were hired by Xiao Ye, a local businessman, to have sex with city officials and secretly videotape the trysts. Xiao then promised to make the tapes go away – for a price.

In Lei's case, a property developer agreed to provide the hush money of 3 million yuan in return for his patronage in business deals. Prosecutors say the transaction amounts to a bribe that Lei accepted, but defense attorney Ye Dongqiang said his client had always considered it a loan and had kept a record of it.

"We believe that from a truth-seeking, legal perspective, it does not amount to bribery," Ye said in an interview. "We can't just convict him because this case has a big social impact and because there are negative remarks in society. He has violated morals, but the law must have a bottom line."

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Associated Press researcher Flora Ji contributed to this report.

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Follow Gillian Wong on Twitter at twitter.com/gillianwong

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Tai Chi For Fitness: Slow-Moving Chinese Exercise Can Improve Health

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By Dorene Internicola

NEW YORK, June 17 (Reuters) - For modern, harried lifestyles focused on getting and spending, fitness experts say tai chi, the ancient Chinese slow-moving exercise, can be an ideal way for anyone to stay fit.

A staple in senior citizen centers and a common dawn sighting in public parks, the practice can offer long-term benefits for all age groups.

"In this high-tech world that's all about speed, greed and instant gratification, tai chi is the antidote to bring us back to balanced health," according to Arthur Rosenfeld, a tai chi master and the author of a new book called "Tai Chi - The Perfect Exercise: Finding Health, Happiness, Balance, and Strength."

"It doesn't mean you can win the marathon or clean and jerk 750 pounds or win a cycle sprint," said the South Florida resident, 56. "It's not about getting there sooner." Tai chi is more about how the body works than how it looks, and is about aging gracefully and "with less drama."

"The last time I looked, there were some 500 studies about the various physical benefits of tai chi, from improving balance and attention span to boosting the immune system to beating back the symptoms of arthritis, asthma and insomnia," said Rosenfeld.

An estimated 2.3 million U.S. adults have done tai chi in the past 12 months, according to a 2007 National Health Interview Survey.

The practice is not perfect. Tai chi "does not supply the cardiovascular component that we'd be looking for in a well-rounded routine," said Jessica Matthews, a San Diego, California-based exercise physiologist. "The exertion level, while challenging, is not going to increase your heart rate."

'GRAND ULTIMATE MOTION'

T'ai chi ch'uan, as it is formally known, derives from a form of Chinese martial arts. Explaining the slow, circular movement of the practice, Rosenfeld said tai chi is a philosophical term that means the harmonious interplay of opposing forces.

When nature encounters a strong force, the way it answers that force to maintain harmony in the world is with a spiral, he said. "Astronomers see galaxies moving in spirals, water goes down the drain in a spiral, tornados form as a spiral. We spiral in tai chi because the most effective way to move fluid through solid is a spiral."

Hawaii-based personal and group-fitness trainer Jordan Forth, who has studied tai chi since 2006, said one translation of tai chi is "grand ultimate motion."

"I recommend it to everybody," said Forth. "It teaches people to move well in multiple planes of motion with a state of awareness not cultivated in everyday fitness. Most people check out on a treadmill or during high-intensity activity."

Forth said tai chi improves mobility, movement and flexibility and can be even more dynamic than yoga, which the 35-year-old has studied since he was a teenager.

"With tai chi you're grounded the entire time," he said. "For me, (it) translates more into functional everyday movement."

Matthews, who is also a spokeswoman for the American Council on Exercise, said because tai chi is slow motion and low impact, many assume it's just for older people or not a viable means of exercise.

Not so, she said: Research studies have found that the practice increased mineral bone density, boosted endurance, strengthened the lower body, and eased depression.

(Editing by Patricia Reaney and Eric Walsh)

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