Chinese cops arrest 10 over Hong Kong celebrity nude photos

Police have arrested 10 people in China for producing, selling and buying explicit photos of Hong Kong celebrities, state media reported Wednesday, as the fallout from the scandal rumbled on.

Police in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen have confiscated around 250 discs and six computers with images of actor-singer Edison Chen and a string of starlets in compromising positions, Xinhua news agency reported.

Three suspects were held for five days, and two others were being held under criminal detention and questioned by police, the report said, citing the Shenzhen Municipal Public Security Bureau.

Xinhua did not provide any details on the other five detained.

"The police authorities will severely crack down on the criminal activities of manufacturing, selling and spreading discs of Hong Kong's celebrity photos and other pornography productions," a police spokesman was quoted as saying.

The photos of Chen and at least seven stars -- including Cantopop singer Gillian Chung, actress Cecilia Cheung and former actress Bobo Chan -- began appearing last month on the Internet.

Chen has been romantically linked to all three in the past. Media reports say the photos were copied from Chen's computer when he sent it in for repairs.

Last week, Chen issued a statement on video website YouTube, in which he apologized to "anyone who has been affected by this strange, strange ordeal."

Hong Kong police have made several arrests linked to the case, but have faced criticism that they have been over-zealous. A charge against one Hong Kong man detained over the photos was dropped last week.

On Tuesday, Chinese censors ordered the nation's most popular Internet search engine, Baidu, to apologies for allowing the sexually-explicit photos to be published on its site.

In a separate Xinhua report, more than 40 domestic websites have supported a joint statement by 13 Chinese portals to prevent the spread of the photos.

Via inquirer.net