Border police said Saturday that they broke up a gang of makeshift pirates who preyed on vessels filled with valuable metal waste that traveled between Japan and Ningbo in Zhejiang Province.
Border inspection police said nine migrant workers from Anhui and Jiangxi provinces were hired by a ringleader. These migrant workers went inside the vessels, and transferred the metals into smaller boats. They used force on some occasions.
They began in March 2009 and authorities cracked open the ring in October, according to a report by people.com.cn.
It was not clear why police waited until now to discuss the problem.
Ships from Japan to Ningbo port, the second largest port in China, were the main targets of the ring, the report said.
The men launched their attacks when ships were waiting for customs clearance at night. The pirates would unload the goods into smaller ironclad boats.
An unidentified officer from Ningbo border inspection told the website that the domestic pirates looted several tons of metal waste that is worth between 10,000 yuan ($1,464) and 40,000 yuan ($5,859) a hit.
These migrant workers are "thieves" and should not be called "pirates," a man surnamed Wang from a metal waste-processing base in Ningbo, told the Global Times Sunday.
The investigation revealed that the operation was organized, said Zhang Xialin, an officer from the border inspection office. If the workers on the cargo vessels confronted the pirates, they were attacked and the pirates would not back off.
Police dubbed the ring "Pirates Company Ltd," after the crackdown in October. The leader surnamed Xu confessed to police.
Police also arrested other pirates in the operations.
The detained suspects said the group leader took 70 percent of the proceeds and his role was to provide ironclad boats and sell loots, and the migrant workers took 30 percent in additional to a regular monthly salary of 1,000 yuan ($146).
Each migrant worker got about 300 yuan ($43) out of wastes worth 10,000 yuan.
The migrant workers launched attacks almost every night and committed 45 acts of piracy in two months.
They even refused to have rest during very bad weather and when typhoon Morakot hit Ningbo, police said.
The waste dismantling industry is advanced in the province.
High profits from metal waste processing have encouraged theft, said an earlier report by hz66.com, a news website hosted by the local government.
The report said police found it hard to gather evidence to bring charges against the suspects, who just dumped the products into the water when they were about to be caught.
The suspects then continued with their business after a few days in detention.
The suspects managed to escape police raids by selling their loots in other cities.
Officials told the report that the crackdown on pirates in Ningbo was difficult because there are nine departments handling sea affairs.
"Nine law-enforcement teams including police, customs officers, port police are managing sea affairs at the same time," Xu Jinchun, an official from Ningbo's border inspection office, said. "But they lack effective cooperation."
Xu said each department has different regulations about handling cases.