China Tells

据伦敦金融时报报道，力拓间谍门事件最近闹得沸沸扬扬。据中国日报报道，中国政府已经掌握了力拓贿赂中国钢铁厂高官的确凿证据，并且将对犯罪者严惩不贷。据业内人士称，在力拓上海分公司电脑里发现的钢铁厂资料属于高度机密，即使有些钢厂的老总也不清楚这些机密。力拓在最近与中国钢协的谈判中利用这些资料提高其谈判地位，因此无疑触犯了贿赂罪和窃取机密罪。国内其他媒体也对其进行了分析。

(FT) China’s “whole steel industry has been bribed” by Rio Tinto, suggested a lead article in the China Daily newspaper on Wednesday that marks a sharp escalation in a dispute rocking the global steel and iron ore industries.

The state-owned China Daily quoted an unnamed “industry insider” claiming Rio bribed each of the 16 Chinese steel companies involved in this year’s negotiations to set the benchmark iron ore price, a process that brings together steelmakers and suppliers of iron ore, steel’s key ingredient.

Rio has made limited comment on a crisis that began on July 5 when Chinese authorities detained Stern Hu, an Australian who is the company’s chief iron ore negotiator in China, along with three Chinese employees of the Anglo-Australian mining group.

The company has said in the past week it is unaware of any evidence to support Chinese allegations that Mr Hu was involved in espionage and the theft of state secrets.

But Rio, according to Chinese press accounts, possessed information about the Chinese steel industry too sensitive to be obtained publicly. Rio computers seized in Shanghai this week, Chinese media reported, revealed data about Chinese steel companies so detailed, one unnamed source in the China Daily claimed, that even the presidents of those companies might not have known them.

Such information could be used to boost Rio’s negotiating position in the iron ore pricing round with Chinese steelmakers.

Rio officials say the company is supporting the Australian government’s efforts for a diplomatic solution and is chiefly concerned for the safety of its employees. But there is no indication yet that either the company or the Australian government understand the full extent of charges against the Rio employees.

Wednesday’s report in the China Daily appeared as Kevin Rudd, Australia’s prime minister and a former diplomat in Beijing, toughened his stance on the detention of the Rio employees. Mr Rudd warned Beijing that the case was being watched by ”a range of foreign governments and corporations”.

“They will be drawing their own conclusions as to how it is conducted,” he added.

Within days of Mr Hu’s detention, the Chinese government’s case widened to a probe of bribery and corruption in China’s steel industry.

As much as allegations centre on Rio Tinto, their effect has been to throw China’s steel industry into confusion, as implications of endemic corruption threaten a root-and-branch overhaul of the way business is conducted.

Several steel industry executives have reportedly been questioned or detained.

The government’s hardline approach to corruption was reinforced on Wednesday when a Chinese court sentenced Chen Tonghai, a former chairman of state-owned oil giant Sinopec, to a suspended death sentence for accepting over $28m in bribes from 2000 to 2007. Rio Tinto could emerge in coming months, one analyst suggested, as a catalyst in a new campaign to crack down on corruption in Chinese industry.

Lacking definitive information from either the Chinese government or Rio, many observers questioned Mr Hu’s detention coming one month after Rio abandoned a business deal with Chinalco, a state-owned mining company and industrial champion.

Chinalco would have solved Rio’s debt problems by injecting $19.5bn in exchange for partial ownership of many of Rio’s best mines. But the landmark business proposal failed at the eleventh hour, amid widespread criticism in Australia, and Rio partnered instead with rival BHP Billiton, proposing an iron ore joint venture that Chinese officials criticised as possibly anticompetitve.

Jan du Plessis, Rio’s chairman, said at the time that Chinalco’s owners understood the reasons Rio withdrew from the deal, and dismissed the possibility of political repercussions.

At the time of the Chinalco deal’s collapse Rio and other iron ore majors BHP Billiton and Vale were involved in contentious negotiations to set this year’s iron ore price. The China Iron and Steel Association (CISA), representing Baosteel and other huge Chinese steelmakers, pushed for a price cut of between 40 and 50 per cent, arguing that collapsed demand for steel should be reflected by lower input prices.

Rio held firm, however, establishing with Japanese and South Korean steelmakers a 33 per cent price cut that CISA continued to resist. One Chinese press report indicated that Rio negotiators’ “aggressive” insistence on this lower discount showed the company had critical information that informed how far it could push the Chinese steelmakers.

The China Daily quoted an unnamed senior manager at a large steel company saying, ”Rio Tinto got to know the key executives of the 16 steel mills, who have sensitive industry information, when [CISA] brought them to the bargaining table.”

”Then Rio Tinto bribed them which has become an unwritten industry practice … If the companies didn’t accept, they would have cut supplies and so the whole steel industry has been bribed.”

A Rio representative on Wednesday reiterated the company had acted with integrity.

“As the company has said in an earlier statement, Rio Tinto is committed to high standards in business integrity and takes its ethical responsibilities very seriously.”

Rio said on Wednesday it is not delaying any shipments of iron ore to China as the controversy unfolded. “It’s business as usual in terms of production and shipments to customers,” a representative said. China remains the biggest market for Australian iron ore producers.

Unconfirmed reports this week suggested the Chinese government might cancel up to 20 iron ore import licences. This was cited on Tuesday as a reason behind a jump in the spot price of iron ore, as some traders said Australian iron ore miners had stopped shipments until there was clarity of counterparty risk.

Reports of license reviews have led analysts to speculate that the corruption probe is motivated largely by a push to reorganise China’s steel industry and possibly enhance CISA’s power over it.  Australia’s Mr Rudd indicated that while Australia had ”significant economic interests” in China, its relationship with China was not one-way.

“China, too, has significant economic interests at stake in its relationship with Australia and with its other commercial partners around the world,” he told reporters.

Mr Rudd said it was in everyone’s interest to have the matter resolved but warned that Mr Hu’s case was complex and there was no quick fix.

Mr Rudd said the foreign office had made representations to the acting Chinese ambassador on three occasions, and that the Australian embassy in Beijing and the consular general in Shanghai had made “some 20” representations in support of Mr Hu. He also raised the matter directly with China’s vice foreign minister at the G8 summit in Italy last week.

However, Beijing has repeatedly ignored Canberra’s attempts to extract details about the Rio employees’ detention.

Rio shares closed 2 per cent higher in Sydney at A$50.08 and ended 85p or more than 4 per cent stronger in London at £21.04½p.