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Chinese authorities have released five employees of US due diligence firm Mintz Group from detention, two years after Xi Jinping’s administration cracked down on consultancies working with foreign multinationals.
“We understand that the Mintz Group Beijing employees who were detained, all Chinese nationals, have now all been released,” a spokesperson for the company told the Financial Times.
“We are grateful to the Chinese authorities that our former colleagues can now be home with their families,” they added.
The Mintz staff were detained by Beijing’s public security bureau following a raid on the company’s office in the Chinese capital in 2023, which alarmed foreign investors in the country.
The Mintz employees were charged with engaging in activities outside the formal scope of the company’s business licence, according to a person familiar with the matter.
It was not immediately clear if all legal proceedings related to the company in China have been resolved. Following the detentions in 2023, Mintz closed its China and Hong Kong offices.
The FT reported in late 2023 that between March 2019 and July 2022, the US firm had conducted 37 investigations involving “foreign-related statistics inquiries” without obtaining legally required approval, according to the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Statistics.
Mintz was also required to pay a fine of about $1.5mn levied separately by the bureau.
The company declined to comment further on Tuesday.
The Mintz detentions were part of a wave of investigations targeting the China operations of US consultancies and due diligence firms, including Bain & Co and expert network group Capvision.
The raids on the companies’ Chinese offices, and the detentions of Mintz employees, left lingering fears among the foreign business community in China over their personal safety.
The releases on Tuesday come as Xi is courting foreign business leaders to attract investment as growth in the world’s second-biggest economy has slowed and US President Donald Trump increases tariffs on Chinese exports.
Scores of international business leaders including Apple chief executive Tim Cook, Pfizer boss Albert Bourla and Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon have travelled to China in recent days to meet senior Chinese leaders.
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