Officials punished for preventing environmental checks

A staff member of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage asks reporters to "Get out" as members of the media surrounded him asking for an interview during an environmental check on its canteen cooking fumes on June 4, 2014. [Photo: The Beijing News/Gao Wei]

A staff member of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage talks with officials of the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Corps outside the State Administration of Cultural Heritage on June 4, 2014. [Photo: The Beijing News/Gao Wei]

Staff members at the State Administration of Cultural Heritage will be punished for preventing an unscheduled environmental spot-check on the cooking fumes emitted from the bureau's canteen and subsequent media interviews that followed on June 4, Xinhua News Agency reports.

The cultural heritage bureau said on its verified Weibo microblog account on Thursday that they had launched a special investigation into the incident, and had already cooperated fully with the environmental monitoring officials to finish the check on Wednesday afternoon.

The post claimed that the staff members responsible for the incident violated their working principles and revealed problems in regards to their approach to their work. The bureau has stated that it will punish those members of staff involved, ask related departments to rectify their mistakes and accept media and public supervision in the future.

According to media reports, officials of the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Corps were prevented from carrying out their work by staff members of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage during an unscheduled spot-check. A staff member with the bureau even asked reporters surrounding him for an interview to "Get out."