BEIJING, July 23 (Reuter)  China has opened a new drug rehabilitation centre
on the outskirts of Beijing to help the rising number of addicts in the
capital and also to treat foreign addicts, the China Daily said on Wednesday.

The Sunkuang rehabilitation centre opened its doors to Chinese addicts on
Monday and planned to offer services to addicts from around the world, the
newspaper said. 

``It is expected to be available to foreigners by the middle of next year,
since many people prefer to go through rehabilitation abroad,'' the China
Daily quoted centre supervisor Hu Xiaogang as saying. 

A three month rehabilitation course would cost addicts 6,0008,000 yuan
($722964), it said but gave no details of the rates for foreigners. 

Staff would be able to treat up to 2,000 addicts at the centre in a rural
northeastern county of Beijing, making it the backbone of the capital's
antidrug efforts and one of China's two biggest rehabilitation centres, it
said. 

Beijing had registered 4,545 drug users, but an estimated 22,000 people were
abusing narcotics in the capital, which like other Chinese cities has been
swept by a tide of illegal drugs as economic reforms loosen oncestrict
social controls. 

China frequently executes people convicted of drug trafficking and other
offences, but officials at the new centre said drug users who were not
involved in other crimes would not be punished or interrogated. 

($18.3 yuan)  

02:20 072397