BEIJING (Reuters) - The customs authority in the Chinese port city of Qingdao has detained three Chinese employees of a subsidiary of the Japanese trading giant Marubeni Corp <8002.T> on suspicion of smuggling, a spokeswoman said on Thursday.
She said that the authority's anti-smuggling office was still investigating and could provide no further details at this stage.
A spokesman at the Japanese trading house said earlier that the employees worked at a Chinese unit of Columbia Grain, Inc, its subsidiary. Industry sources said that the detentions were prompted by allegations of tax evasion on soy beans imports. Chinese customs sometimes use smuggling as a broader term for tax evasion.
(Reporting by Niu Shuping and David Stanway; Editing by Ed Davies)
