{"id":187615,"date":"2015-10-12T15:37:18","date_gmt":"2015-10-12T22:37:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/?p=187615"},"modified":"2015-10-13T11:20:03","modified_gmt":"2015-10-13T18:20:03","slug":"two-former-top-party-officials-sentenced-over-bribes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinadigitaltimes.net\/2015\/10\/two-former-top-party-officials-sentenced-over-bribes\/","title":{"rendered":"Zhou Yongkang’s Allies Sentenced [Updated]"},"content":{"rendered":"
Chinese courts announced\u00a0on Monday, October 12, that two key allies of former security chief Zhou Yongkang, himself\u00a0sentenced to life in prison in June<\/a> amid Xi Jinping’s ongoing anti-corruption campaign, have been given fines and lengthy prison sentences for accepting bribes<\/strong><\/a>. The New York Times’ Michael Forsythe reports:<\/p>\n Jiang Jiemin, the former party official who once ran China\u2019s largest\u00a0oil<\/a>\u00a0and gas company, was sentenced to 16 years after confessing to taking bribes, a\u00a0court<\/a>\u00a0in central China announced. Another court\u00a0sentenced<\/a>\u00a0Li Chuncheng, a former top party official in Sichuan Province in southwestern China, to 13 years for the same offense. Both men were fined 1 million renminbi, or about $158,000.<\/p>\n […]\u00a0The downfall of both men served as signals that the Communist Party was investigating Mr. Zhou, a former member of the party\u2019s elite Politburo Standing Committee and the most senior individual to be tried for corruption in the 66-year history of the People\u2019s Republic. Both men acted under Mr. Zhou\u2019s orders to illegally give assistance to other people, causing the state to lose $235.6 million, according to the\u00a0court judgment<\/a>\u00a0on Mr. Zhou issued in June. [Source<\/a><\/strong>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The Wall Street Journal’s Brian Spegele and Josh Chin\u00a0detail\u00a0the two former official’s connection to Zhou Yongkang and their offenses as described by court statements<\/strong><\/a>, characterizing\u00a0their sentencing as the closing of one chapter of Xi’s anti-corruption drive:<\/p>\n Some years before taking charge of China\u2019s domestic security operations, Mr. Zhou was chairman of China National Petroleum Corp.\u2014the company later headed by Mr. Jiang\u2014and investigations into his allies marked the first step in a continuing investigation of China\u2019s vast, state-controlled oil industry. CNPC, the country\u2019s biggest oil company by volume, holds sway over energy policy, and top CNPC officials regularly go on to serve as senior political leaders.<\/p>\n […] Mr. Jiang, who led CNPC and its listed subsidiary,\u00a0PetroChina<\/a>\u00a0Co.<\/span>, through a period of rapid growth, was convicted of bribery after a Chinese court in Hubei province found he amassed more than 14 million yuan ($2.2 million) in assets whose origin couldn\u2019t be accounted for.<\/p>\n […] Mr. Li was the first high-ranking official to fall in the anticorruption drive. Like Mr. Jiang, Mr. Li worked for a time under Mr. Zhou, who served as party chief of Sichuan from 1999 to 2002. The court statement didn\u2019t mention Mr. Zhou by name.<\/p>\n The statement said Mr. Li had taken bribes totaling 39.8 million yuan while holding various posts between 1999 and 2012. By using his position to aid associates\u2019 business interests, he also caused the loss of more than 572 million yuan in public assets, the statement said. It added that Mr. Li confessed, expressed regret over his crimes and returned the bribes, and that he was given a lighter sentence as a result. [Source<\/strong><\/a>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Several officials with connections to state run oil firms\u00a0have fallen\u00a0amid\u00a0Xi’s anti-corruption campaign. In March, former China National Petroleum Corp. officials and Zhou allies Wang Yongchun and Guo Yongxiang\u00a0were charged with\u00a0corruption<\/a>. In April, an investigation into\u00a0Wang Tianpu<\/a>, president of CNPC rival Sinopec, was launched; earlier this month an investigation into former top Sinopec\u00a0executive Su Shulin was announced<\/a>.<\/p>\n Updated at 10:15 PDT on\u00a0October 13, 2015: <\/strong>Former deputy general manager of CNPC\u00a0Wang Yongchun and deputy governor of Sichuan province Guo Yongxiang have been sentenced to 20 years by separate courts<\/a><\/strong>. Both men were close allies of former security chief Zhou Yongkang. Michael Martina and\u00a0Ben Blanchard report for Reuters:<\/p>\n A court in central China on Tuesday jailed a former senior Chinese energy executive for 20 years on corruption charges, the latest official to fall in a sweeping anti-graft campaign linked to allies of disgraced security chief Zhou Yongkang.<\/p>\n […]\u00a0Wang Yongchun was a deputy general manager at China’s biggest oil company, China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) [CNPET.UL], until he became caught up in a graft probe last year.<\/p>\n […] “The property of defendant Wang Yongchun and his family obviously exceeded legal income, and the source of $42.5 million yuan ($6.7 million) in assets could not be explained,” the Xiangyang city Intermediate Court in Hubei province said in a statement.<\/p>\n […]\u00a0Another Zhou aide from Sichuan, Guo Yongxiang, was sentenced to 20 years in prison on Tuesday in a separate Hubei court for bribery and other crimes. [Source<\/strong><\/a>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n