该文章首次发表在钱伯斯（Chambers and Partners）2023大中华区法律指南中。环球律师事务所受邀独家撰写中国公司调查/反腐败（Corporate Investigations/Anti-Corruptio）领域的专业文章。
Overview
概述
Corporate investigations mainly include handling government investigations and conducting internal investigations, which are closely interconnected since the most complicated, urgent and sensitive internal investigations are always triggered by government investigations and the corresponding regulatory environment. Thus, corporate investigations related to anti-corruption are largely driven by government enforcement actions, for which, it could be further divided into three main dimensions in the PRC legal system: (1) administrative legislations and enforcement actions by the Administrations for Market Regulation (AMR); (2) criminal legislations and enforcement actions on cases not involving public officials by the Public Security Bureaus; and (3) legislations and enforcement actions on cases involving public officials by the Supervisory Commissions. Further, cross-border investigations involving multiple jurisdictions are complicated with additional legal and compliance restrictions and considerations.
公司调查主要包括应对政府调查及开展内部调查。两者密不可分，因为实践中最复杂、最紧急、最敏感的内部调查往往是因为政府调查和相应的监管环境所引发的。反腐败公司调查往往也是由政府的执法行动驱动的。在中国法律体系中，政府调查可以进一步分为三个主要的板块：（1）市场监督管理部门（市监部门）主导的行政立法和执法；（2）公安机关主导的不涉及公职人员案件的刑事立法和执法；以及（3）监察委员会主导的涉及公职人员案件的立法和执法。此外，涉及多个司法管辖区域的跨境调查因受到额外的法律和合规限制和考量而更为复杂。
Anti-corruption Administrative Legislation and Enforcement Trend
反腐败行政立法与执法趋势
Substantively, the most significant change in the past few years could be the revision of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law (AUCL), which came into effect on 1 January 2018. In general, the AUCL has increased the maximum fine for commercial bribery from CNY200,000 to CNY3 million and specified the constitutive elements of commercial bribery. On November 22, 2022, China SAMR proposed an AUCL revision for consultation by adding transaction counterparties at the entity level as the receiver of bribery, reflecting a stricter attitude against commercial bribery. At the local law enforcement level, a number of provinces have successively formulated local Anti-Unfair Competition Regulations, encouraging enterprises to establish and improve anti-commercial bribery compliance systems, and requiring the AMRs to inspect the compliance systems during inspection and investigation.
在实体法层面，过去几年里最重要变化莫过于2018年1月1日修订的《反不正当竞争法》。总体而言，《反不正当竞争法》将对商业贿赂的罚款上限从20万元人民币提升至300万元人民币，并且重新定义了商业贿赂行为的构成要件。2022年11月22日，国家市场监督管理总局发布了《反不正当竞争法》的修订草案征求意见稿，在主体层面将交易相对方包括在受贿主体之内，反映了对商业贿赂行政执法的更严格态度。在地方执法层面，多个省份已陆续制定了地方性的《反不正当竞争条例》，鼓励经营者建立健全反商业贿赂合规体系，要求市监部门在案件查处过程中对反腐败合规体系实施情况开展检查。
Procedurally, in 2021, the newly revised Administrative Penalty Law has strengthened the system of case transferring between the administrative and criminal authorities, and authorised administrative authorities to formulate the discretion benchmark system for administrative penalties. As of November 2022, at least 15 provincial AMRs have formulated local administrative discretion benchmarks systems, dividing the level of penalty into no administrative penalty, lighter or mitigated administrative penalty, and heavier administrative penalty, by comprehensively considering the facts, nature, circumstances, subjective faults of the parties concerned and other factors.
在程序法层面，2021年修订的《行政处罚法》强化了行刑衔接制度，授权行政机关制定行政处罚裁量基准。截至2022年11月，至少15个省级市监部门已出台地方性的行政处罚裁量基准，将行政处罚的适用分为不予行政处罚、减轻行政处罚、从轻行政处罚和从重行政处罚，在作出处罚决定时综合考虑违法行为的事实、性质、情节、社会危害程度以及当事人主观过错等因素。
In terms of enforcement, taking Shanghai as an example, in recent years, the lowest bribery amount we observed in a single case was only CNY169, which reflects the tightening trend of cracking down on bribery cases.
在执法方面，以上海为例，我们注意到，近年来单个案件中最低的行贿金额仅169元人民币，体现出处罚力度加强的趋势。
Anti-corruption Criminal Legislation and Enforcement Trend
反腐败刑事立法与执法趋势
Substantively, the Eleventh Amendment to the Criminal Law, which was released on 26 December 2020, has increased the maximum penalty for the crime of bribery-taking by non-state functionaries from 15-year imprisonment for cases involving a huge amount of money to life imprisonment for cases involving extremely huge amounts of money or with other especially serious circumstances.
在实体法层面，2020年12月26日通过的《刑法修正案（十一）》提高了非国家工作人员受贿罪的法定最高刑，由数额巨大所对应的最高15年有期徒刑调整为数额特别巨大或者有其他特别严重情节所对应的最高无期徒刑。
Procedurally, the system of plea-bargaining has been established by the Criminal Procedure Law in 2018. The system of plea-bargaining gives the People’s Procuratorates (Procuratorates) certain discretion in proposing conviction and sentencing and requires the defendant’s voluntariness of confession and authenticity and legitimacy of the content of the plea agreement.
在程序法层面，2018年修正的《刑事诉讼法》建立了认罪认罚从宽制度。该制度赋予人民检察院（检察院）在提出定罪量刑建议方面一定的裁量权，并要求被告人的认罪认罚基于自愿，所签署的认罪认罚具结书内容应当真实且合法。
In addition, the Supreme People's Procuratorate has been promoting pilot programs on corporate compliance reforms, including "non-arrest based on compliance", "non-prosecution based on compliance", and "leniency application based on pleading guilty". The pilot started in March 2020 and expanded to ten provinces and cities in March 2021, introducing third-party supervision and evaluation organisations to investigate, evaluate, supervise and examine the compliance commitments of enterprises involved in cases. The examination results will be an important reference for the Procuratorates to handle the cases.
此外，最高人民检察院正在开展企业刑事合规改革试点，包括“合规不批捕”、“合规不起诉”及“认罪认罚从宽”。试点从2020年3月开始，2021年3月将试点范围扩大到十个省市，包括引入第三方监督评估组织，对涉案企业的合规承诺进行调查、评估、监督和考察。考察结果将作为检察院依法处理案件的重要参考。
In terms of criminal judicial judgments, public statistics in the annual reports released by the Supreme People’s Court shows that, in the past eight years, the number of corruption, bribery and other duty-related criminal cases concluded by people’s courts at all levels has reached more than 22,000 each year, and the number of individuals involved has reached more than 26,000 each year.
在刑事司法判决方面，最高人民法院公布的年度工作报告统计数据显示，近8年来各级人民法院审结的贪污贿赂等职务犯罪的案件数量每年均达到2.2万件以上，涉案人员每年均达到2.6万人以上。
Anti-corruption Supervisory Legislation and Enforcement Trend
反腐败监察立法与执法趋势
In order to strengthen the supervision of all public officials exercising public power and to intensify the anti-corruption effort, China formally established a supervision system in 2018. On 11 March 2018, the Constitution was amended, granting the Supervisory Commissions the same constitutional status as People’s Courts and People’s Procuratorates. The Supervisory Commissions are responsible for investigating suspected corruption and bribery and other duty-related illegal acts and crimes, taking a stronger position in leading related investigations. Notably, the Supervisory Commission can investigate not only public officials, but also other individuals involved in bribery cases. In recent years, we have noticed cases in which non-public officials were detained by the Supervisory Commissions due to involvement in bribery cases.
为深入开展反腐败工作，并进一步加强对行使公权力的公职人员的监督，自2018年起中国正式建立了监察体制。2018年3月11日，《中华人民共和国宪法》进行了第五次修订，监察委员会进而取得了在宪法上与法院、检察院同等的宪法地位。监察委员会负责对涉嫌贪污贿赂等职务违法与职务犯罪行为进行调查，在相关的调查中发挥突出的领导作用。值得注意的是，监察委员会不仅有权对公职人员开展调查，对于涉及贿赂案件的其他个人，也有权调查。近年来，我们也注意到，存在非公职人员因涉嫌贿赂案件而被监察委员会留置的情况。
In terms of law enforcement, in September 2021, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervision Commission, in concert with the relevant entities, jointly proposed to impose restrictions on market access of bribery-offering parties and explore the implementation of a “blacklist” system, indicating that the investigation and punishment of offering bribes will be further strengthened in anti-corruption cases. In March 2022, the State Supervisory Commission, in conjunction with the Supreme People's Procuratorate published five representative cases related to the crime of offering bribery and requested the enforcement authorities to attach great importance to investigate cases related to bribery offering.
在执法方面，2021年9月，中央纪委、国家监察委员会会同有关单位联合提出对行贿方的市场准入实施限制，探索推行行贿人“黑名单”制度。这预示着在反腐败案件中，对于行贿方的调查处理将会得到进一步的加强。2022年3月，国家监察委员会会同最高人民检察院公布了5起行贿犯罪的代表性案例，并要求相关执法机关高度重视查处行贿犯罪案件。
Cross-border Investigations
跨境调查
Under the circumstances where a government investigation involves multiple jurisdictions, conflicting law issues might arise. The International Criminal Judicial Assistance Law (ICJAL) enacted in 2018 clearly prohibits any unauthorised criminal investigation by any means, either directly conducted by the foreign authorities, or collaterally through instructing companies in China to collect evidence through internal investigation. Further, the newly enacted Data Security Law and the Personal Information Protection Law regulate providing data stored within China to foreign judicial or law enforcement agencies. As cross-border investigations are frequently implicated with other restrictions on transfer of protected data such as state secrets, important data, etc., under the relevant PRC laws and regulations, comprehensive analysis on all relevant legal issues would be required.
在政府调查涉及多个司法管辖区域的情况下，可能会引发法律适用冲突的问题。2018年颁布的《国际刑事司法协助法》（ICJAL）明确禁止以任何方式进行未经授权的刑事调查。由此，无论是由外国政府直接进行的调查，还是间接地通过指示在中国的公司通过内部调查的方式收集证据，都需经中国相关负责部门审查通过后方可开展。此外，新颁布的《数据安全法》和《个人信息保护法》对向外国司法或执法机构提供存储在中国境内的数据进行了规范。由于跨境调查经常涉及其他受保护数据的传输限制，如国家机密、重要数据等，企业也应当根据中国法律法规对所有相关的法律问题进行全面分析。
Outlook and Recommendations
展望与建议
Anti-corruption remains a priority for China, as evidenced by the from-the-top claims of a zero-tolerance approach to corruption along with the evolving legislation trend and intensified government enforcement actions. Correspondingly, in order to contain the compliance risks associated with bribery and corruption, more commitments to compliance from companies are highly suggested, which could be initially achieved through a well-designed and implemented compliance system, covering the dimensions including due diligence on third parties, financial and operational internal control, standardisation on the gift and entertainment policies, management of business partners, an effective reporting mechanism, a proper investigation process, a crisis-management process, and corrective measures for discovered issues.
反腐败在中国始终是重要议题，中国自上而下对腐败采取零容忍的态度，不断变化的立法趋势和政府执法行动的不断加强均证明了这一点。相应地，为了控制与贿赂和腐败相关的合规风险，我们也强烈建议企业设计并实施完善的合规体系，做出更多的合规努力。合规体系需涵盖对第三方的尽职调查、财务和运营的内部控制、标准化的礼品和招待政策、业务合作伙伴的管理、有效的报告机制、适当的调查流程、危机管理流程以及对发现问题的整改措施等方面。
Notably, special attention and preparation are required on handling potential government investigations or inquiries where proper responsive actions may likely help to alleviate the risks through necessary efforts including internal investigation, evidence preservation, proactive communication with the authorities, control of media and public exposure, etc. For those matters involving complex issues or delicate situations, professional legal support should be sought in a timely manner.
值得注意的是，在处理潜在的政府调查或问询时，对政府调查或问询作出适当及合理的应对将有助于减轻相关风险。相关的应对措施包括开展内部调查、证据保全、与政府部门积极沟通、控制媒体舆论和公众曝光等。当政府调查或问询涉及复杂问题或敏感情形时，企业也应及时寻求专业的法律支持。
