BEIJING - As China cracks down on environmental violations, authorities handed out punishment in 19,289 cases in the first half of the year, the Ministry of Environmental Protection said on Tuesday.

Violators were fined a total of 743.25 million yuan ($121 million), the ministry said in a statement.

According to the ministry's statistics, East China's Zhejiang province tops the punishment list with 4,077 cases punished and 187.22 million yuan of fines in the region. Six other regions including Beijing, Hebei and Jiangsu saw more than 1,000 violators punished respectively.

A majority of cases involved violations in environmental evaluation, with water, air, solid waste and noise pollution also high on the list.

Environmental authorities at all levels transferred 861 cases of suspected environment-related crimes, such as discharging heavy metal or persistent organic pollutants, to the police for criminal investigations.

Also on Tuesday, the ministry published a circular to promote the supervision over government enforcers' work in environmental regulation enforcement.

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