Business GlaxoSmithKline Fined $490m for Bribery in China

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LequteMan

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China has fined UK pharmaceuticals firm GlaxoSmithKline $490m (£297m) after a court found it guilty of allegations the drug giant paid out bribes to doctors and hospitals in order to have their products promoted.

GSK's Ebola vaccine which wad co-developed with the U.S. National Institutes of Health is currently on trial in the UK.

The court gave GSK's former head of Chinese operations, Mark Reilly, a suspended three-year prison sentence and he is set to be deported.

Other GSK executives have also been given suspended jail sentences.

The guilty verdict was delivered after a one-day trial at a court in Changsha, according to the Xinhua news agency.

Chinese authorities first announced they were investigating GSK in July last year, in what has become the biggest corruption scandal to hit a foreign firm in years. The company was accused of having made an estimated $150m in illegal profits, BBC says.

GSK said it had "published a statement of apology to the Chinese government and its people".

"Reaching a conclusion in the investigation of our Chinese business is important, but this has been a deeply disappointing matter for GSK," said chief executive Sir Andrew Witty in a statement.

"We have and will continue to learn from this. GSK has been in China for close to a hundred years and we remain fully committed to the country and its people," he said.

"We will also continue to invest directly in the country to support the government's health care reform agenda and long-term plans for economic growth."

#Ebola #GSK #China

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