BEIJING -- China's Supreme People's Court (SPC) announced on July 24 that criminals committing sexual assault against children that are "extremely vile in nature" and cause "extremely severe consequences" will be sentenced to death with no leniency.

The SPC published four typical cases concerning sex offenses against children, including the case of Wei Minghui who was recently executed for raping and killing a young girl. The three criminals involved in the other three cases have been given heavy punishments.

The crimes of sexual assault against children gravely damage the physical and mental health of children and seriously violate social ethics and morals, to which the SPC has always maintained a hard-line stance of zero tolerance, the SPC said.

Child sex offenders will be sentenced to heavier punishments within the limits of the prescribed punishments, according to the SPC.

Courts across the country concluded 8,332 cases of sex offenses against children from 2017 to June 2019, according to the SPC, adding that recent years have seen an increasing number of such cases due to the public's strengthened awareness of child protection and reporting cases immediately.

The Intermediate People's Court of Linyi in Shandong Province on Wednesday morning executed He Long, a criminal who raped young girls under the age of 14 and forced them into prostitution, upon verification and approval of the SPC.