Roundup: Public Security Greatly Improved in Macao SAR

Under the "one country, two systems" principle, the life style of residents in the Macao Special Administrative Region (SAR) remains unchanged. The change is that they feel safer than before.

Many residents attribute improving public security to the hard work of police forces of the Macao SAR and the strong backing of the central government and police authorities in neighboring areas.

Bad public security used to be rather disturbing before Macao's return to the motherland. Therefore, the improvement of public security has been taken as a priority in the entire work of the SAR government.

With optimized organizational structure, various types of police forces have become well coordinated to exert concerted efforts fighting against criminal activities, according to Cheong Kuoc Va, secretary for security of the Macao SAR government.

"In order to raise the quality and morale of the police, we have strengthened training of various forms," Cheong said. "In addition, we have tightened discipline, meted out rewards and punishments fairly and weeded out bad members."

In the meantime, the police have increased street patrol and set up round-the-clock electronic supervision devices in areas with frequent occurrence of crimes.

What's more important, local residents are taking an active part in offering clues essential to cracking crimes. And the more universal use of Chinese language helps the police obtain information as soon as possible.

The police have also established close ties with grass-roots social bodies so that the police can blend well with communities.

To reduce the occurrence of illegal cases among the youth, the police often give lectures at schools and youth organizations to help young people foster correct outlook on life.

Police authorities in the Macao SAR have also established regular contacts with China's Ministry of Public Security, the Guangdong Provincial Public Security Department, and police forces in Hong Kong.

Thanks to the severe crackdown upon crimes by the police, the number of murder cases decreased 70 percent this year and the number of arson went down 40 percent, official statistics show.






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