The People's Republic of China, which carries out thousands of executions a year (the exact number is kept secret), has a fleet of dozens of shiny modern killing vans cruising throughout the country waiting and ready for customers. Each is equipped with a lethal injection chamber. The vans are currently supplementing, but have not yet fully replaced, the alternative PRC method of execution, which is a gunshot wound to the head (with the relatives of the deceased required to pay for the bullet before the body will be released to them).
Jinguan, one of the the manufacturers of the vans, is proud of its product and will provide color brochures in English and Chinese for any potential purchasers in foreign countries.
There are at least 68 offences in the PRC which are capital crimes, including tax evasion. A convicted prisoner is allowed one appeal--frequently without the assistance of counsel. The execution is carried out immediately after an appeal is denied.
Although organ harvesting has been illegal in the PRC since 2006, activists claim that the vans still provide an excellent source of organs for transplant, as the execution procedure can be done under sterile conditions and the executees are always cremated afterwards, leaving no evidence of whether or not any of their body parts were removed after death.
The Red Chinese were not the first to come up with the concept of a death chamber in a motor vehicle. That distinction, of course, belongs to the Nazis.
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