Officials admit to faking figures

Several local officials in China's Northeast region sought to explain dramatic economic drops in their areas by admitting they had faked economic data in the past few years to show high growth when the real numbers were much lower, Xinhua News Agency reported on Friday.

"If the past data had not been inflated, the current growth figures would not show such a precipitous fall," one official was quoted as saying.

The report cited several officials in the region who acknowledged they had significantly overstated data ranging from fiscal revenue and household income to GDP.