Chinese Wheat Gluten GM Detained

The general manager of one of the companies accused of selling contaminated wheat gluten to U.S. pet-food suppliers has been detained by the Chinese authorities, according to police officials here and a person who was briefed on the investigation.

The general manager, Mao Lijun, who heads Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development, is being held in Jiangsu Province, about 500 kilometers, or 310 miles, northwest of Shanghai, although a police spokesman in Pei County declined to say on what charges.

In an interview by telephone a few weeks ago, Mao denied any knowledge of how melamine, an industrial chemical, had tainted pet-food supplies sold under his company label this year. He also insisted that his company had never exported any wheat gluten and that his products were only sold in the domestic market.

But regulators in the United States named Xuzhou Anying and another company, Binzhou Futian Biology Technology in Shandong Province, as the only sources of the tainted ingredients that led to one of the biggest pet-food recalls in U.S. history.

Scientists are still trying to explain how melamine, a chemical used to make plastics, fertilizer and surface coatings but not considered very toxic, caused so many deaths.

The contamination, which affected some of the leading American pet-food brands, has been implicated in nearly 4,000 reported cat and dog deaths, the Food and Drug Administration said.

[Source: International Herald Tribune]