Police Recover 300 Million Yuan Worth of Stolen Sichuan Relics

China's Ministry of Public Security announced Thursday that police have broken up 10 criminal gangs that were involved in the theft of cultural relics and recovered artifacts worth 300 million yuan ($44.6 million), bringing a massive two-year investigation to an end.

Seventy suspects have been arrested in connection with illegal underwater excavations at the Jiangkou Chenyin site in the Minjiang River in Sichuan province.

Meishan police first noticed suspicious activity at the site in early 2014 when they discovered that someone had been using professional equipment to carry out unauthorized excavations at night.

Initial investigations by municipal police revealed that the excavations were linked to an illegal relic-selling network involving more than 10 provinces and cities. In April 2015, national authorities became involved in the case. An elite police force numbering 3,000, answering directly to the Ministry of Public Security, embarked on a nationwide hunt for the thieves.

The ministry did not specify exactly when the operation ended. More than 1,000 relics were recovered.

According to the China News Service, the 1-million-square-meter Jiangkou Chenyin site was accorded special conservation status by city authorities in 2010, and is considered by archaeologists to be a valuable source of military artifacts from the late Ming and Qing dynasties.

Local folklore has long suggested that site was where hundreds of boats loaded with gold and silver objects belonging to infamous 17th-century peasant rebel Zhang Xianzhong sank during his rule as king of the short-lived Daxiguo ("Great Western Kingdom").

Zhang rose to prominence as a rebel leader and amassed a large army in the last years of the Ming dynasty in the mid-17th century. He invaded present-day Sichuan in the 1640s and established his rogue kingdom, only to be defeated by the new Qing government three years later.

Zhang's boats sank after being set on fire during a battle, according to folklore. Archaeologists have proved the stories to be partially true. Silver and gold items were found by local residents in 2005, and extensive illegal excavations were carried out after that.

The relics confiscated by the police included eight Grade 1 relics, 38 Grade 2 relics, and 54 Grade 3 relics.

Cultural relics in China are classified according to the 1982 Cultural Relics Protection Law, which distinguishes between "ordinary cultural relics" and "valuable cultural relics," which are further divided into three grades. Grade 1 relics are the rarest and most valuable, and some particularly fragile or unique Grade 1 relics may not be exhibited outside the country.

The Meishan case came to light 17 months after what China Police Daily said was the biggest known case of cultural relic theft since 1949.

In May last year, 1,168 cultural relics worth 500 million yuan were recovered and 175 people arrested for looting and severely damaging Neolithic graves in Liaoning province.

A Ministry of Public Security representative noted that cultural-relic crimes have become more complex and specialized in recent years, with criminals turning to "increasingly sophisticated tools and methods."

Contact Wu Gang (gangwu@caixin.com); editor Kerry Nelson (kerry@caixin.com)