A Guangzhou railway policeman collects fake train tickets on January 12, 2008. [Photo: nddaily.com]

Train ticket counterfeiter Wu was sent to prison in Guangzhou on January 20, 2008. [Photo: nddaily.com]

Train tickets are the hottest products on the market before the annual travel peak around China's Spring Festival period, and railway police are kept busy chasing counterfeiters and scalpers.

Earlier this month, police in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou seized the largest fake train ticket producer of this year, the Nanfang City News reported.

Wu, 36, worked in a textile printing house for three years and learned how to typeset. Last month, he bought the necessary machines, organized several countrymen with criminal records, and started printing fake train tickets.

After receiving a report from a buyer on January 9, the railway police began a three-day investigation, netting Wu and his accomplices on January 12. More than 30,000 fake tickets were confiscated.

The tickets look very professional, police said.

"The railway station needs only five seconds to print a ticket, and I need five minutes," Wu confided after being caught.

(CRI January 22, 2008)