Taipei- Twelve men from mainland China were arrested in Taiwan posing as Buddhist monks for the purposes of swindling money, police said Tuesday.

The 12, with shaven heads and wearing monks' yellow gowns and yellow cloth bags, were arrested Sunday as they were about to board a flight for China from Taoyuan International Airport outside Taipei. They were paraded before reporters at a news conference on Tuesday.

According to the National Immigration Agency (NIA), the 12 men from Shenzhen, south China, entered Taiwan as company managers to attend a furniture exhibition.

After arriving in Taipei, they changed into yellow gowns and began to raise funds to build a Buddhist temple in China, using photographs of a temple under construction to convince people to part with cash. Within 10 days, the group had raised one million Taiwan dollars (30,000 US dollars).

The police were alerted when suspicious locals noticed the men did not have incense burn scars on their heads as real monks would.

The NIA found that the 12 had visited Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam, and suspects the men of being an international fraud ring defrauding people in Buddhist countries.

After being tried on charges of fraud, the men will be deported to China and barred from reentering Taiwan. (dpa)