Bo Xilai sentenced to life in prison for bribery, embezzlement, power abuse

[Vermin]

Bo Xilai sentenced to life in prison for bribery, embezzlement, power abuse

Xinhua, September 22, 2013

Bo Xilai, former secretary of the Chongqing Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and a former member of the CPC Central Committee Political Bureau, was sentenced to life imprisonment on Sunday for bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power.

He was deprived of political rights for life, and his personal assets were also confiscated.

The Jinan Intermediate People's Court in east China's Shandong Province announced the verdict.

Bribes received directly by Bo or via his family totaled 20.44 million yuan (about 3.3 million U.S. dollars), the court decided.

The court also decided that from 1999 to 2012, Bo took advantage of his positions as mayor of the northeastern city of Dalian, secretary of the CPC Dalian City Committee, governor of northeastern Liaoning Province and commerce minister to seek benefits for others.

Bo helped Dalian International Development Co. Ltd., of which Tang Xiaolin was general manager, in taking over the Dalian City liaison office in Shenzhen and also helped Tang obtain quota licenses for importing cars, the court said.

According to court findings, Bo granted Xu Ming, chairman of Dalian Shide Group Co. Ltd., favors in the company's introduction of a football-like sightseeing hot-air balloon and in its bid for a petrochemical project.

The court found that Bo directly accepted cash totaling 1.1 million yuan from Tang. He was aware that his wife Bogu Kailai and their son, Bo Guagua, accepted monetary gains and properties worth 19.33 million from Xu.

 

[Vermin]

Bo accepts bribes worth US$3.3m: verdict

Xinhua, September 22, 2013

Bo Xilai has been found guilty of accepting bribes worth 20.44 million yuan (about 3.3 million U.S. dollars), according to the verdict announced Sunday by the Jinan Intermediate People's Court.

The court also decided that there was insufficient evidence supporting that he accepted 1.34 million yuan worth of air ticket fees as bribes.

Bo's wife and son accepted air ticket fees from businessman Xu Ming, according to the indictment during the first trial in August.

 

[Vermin]

Bo Xilai sentenced to life in prison

Chinese court finds former top politician guilty of corruption, accepting bribes and abuse of power.

Last Modified: 22 Sep 2013 10:13

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A Chinese court has sentenced former leading politician Bo Xilai to life in prison after finding him guilty on charges of graft, accepting bribes and abuse of power.

The Jinan Intermediate People's Court announced the verdict against Bo on Sunday. It also ordered that all his personal assets be seized, according to a transcript carried on the court's official microblog.

The former Politburo member and party chief of the megacity Chongqing vigorously denied any criminal wrongdoings during the trial, but Chinese courts are not independent and a guilty verdict was widely expected.

Bo was escorted into the court by marshals on Sunday morning and stood to listen as the judge began reading the lengthy verdict, which reviewed the facts established in the trial.

Dozens of police, some uniformed and others in plain clothes surrounded the court on Sunday. Barricades and barriers were erected more than 50 metres away from the court to prevent people from approaching.

Though edited transcripts from the trial were posted online, China's government has tightly controlled information about Bo's case, and police erected barriers to stop pedestrians from entering areas around the court.

'Lied in his testimony'

Bo poured billions into public works and social housing programmes while party chief of the southwestern megacity of Chongqing, where he launched a high-profile anti-crime campaign that won him admirers across China.

Despite his popularity, reports of forced confessions and torture during the crime crackdown horrified Chinese liberals, while some top party leaders saw his ambition as challenging the party's cherished unity.

The verdict came as China's new leadership under President Xi Jinping attempts to show it is cracking down on corruption, which he has said threatens the existence of the Communist Party.

The catalyst for Bo's fall came when Wang Lijun, his top aide in Chongqing, fled to a US consulate with evidence the politician's wife had murdered a British associate, Neil Heywood, in February 2012.

Bo told the court that Lijun, the Chongqing police chief, "constantly lied in his testimony".

At the close of Bo's dramatic trial last month, a prosecutor urged the court to punish the disgraced politician with a severe sentence because of his lack of remorse.

Bo mounted a fierce defence against claims that he corruptly obtained 26.8 million yuan ($4.4m) and abused his political position to cover up the killing committed by his wife.

He accused his wife, Gu Kailai, for many of the corruption charges and even some aspects of the abuse of power allegation.

Gu received a suspended death sentence for the murder of Heywood.

Source: Al Jazeera and agencies

 

[Awake]

Bo trial shows obedience is Beijing's goal: analysts
AFP Updated September 23, 2013, 4:24 pm

BEIJING (AFP) - The conviction of disgraced top politician Bo Xilai was less about eradicating ubiquitous corruption in China and more about warning Communist Party cadres to stay loyal to the new leadership or suffer the consequences, observers say.

President Xi Jinping, who took office earlier this year, has vowed to tackle both low-level "flies" and high-ranking "tigers" in an anti-graft drive that has led to expectations that past and present political big-hitters could be targeted.

State media on Monday universally applauded the outcome of Bo's trial, which ended Sunday with the former Chongqing party chief being jailed for life for bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power.

"The sentence Bo received shows that no corrupt element is immune from the fight," the China Daily said in one of many tough-talking editorials.

But despite his high-profile downfall, Beijing's rhetoric is unlikely to be matched with action against endemic graft as long as the newly installed leadership can count on loyalty and obedience, experts say.

Bo's spectacular fall from grace came after the 64-year-old became a standard bearer for those who favoured his populist left-leaning policies.

Observers say this became more of a threat to the legitimacy of the reform-minded political elite than the sensational scandal that engulfed him, including the murder of a British businessman for which Bo's wife was convicted.

The former elite politburo member was convicted of taking 20.4 million yuan ($3.3 million) worth of bribes.

It is an amount that pales into insignificance compared with the huge fortunes alleged to have been amassed by the families of Xi and former premier Wen Jiabao in investigations by US media, said David Zweig from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

But he said that the objective of Bo's trial was not to uncover corruption, but to ensure he was silenced, and that the ending of his political career has the broader aim of weakening the party's left-wing elements.

"It is not just the standard purge," he said. "He will spend a lot of time in jail. It is a message to the left they do not have someone they can rally around here. He is done for."

The trial and sentence have been met with scepticism on China's hugely popular microblogging sites, where users expressed the common view that top officials are routinely corrupt, and that the Bo case was driven by a new set of leaders installed last November.

"I think this is, in reality, a political battle," said one poster on Sina Weibo. "Since the 18th party congress, you must eliminate all the threats against the new leadership to ensure a smooth transfer of power."

Bo staged a feisty defence in court that surprised many observers, and his show of defiance was seen as a factor behind his heavy sentence.

He again erupted in anger when the life sentence was handed down, shouting out "Unfair!" and "Unjust!" according to the South China Morning Post. It did not say how it learned of the comments which were not in official accounts of the closed-door hearing.

Speculation has mounted in recent weeks that Beijing could take the drastic step of targeting an even higher-ranking figure and Bo ally, the recently retired Zhou Yongkang.

The former security tsar served until last November on the then nine-member super elite politburo standing committee, but Willy Lam, China politics expert at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said a move to investigate him is highly unlikely.

"With Bo, Xi Jinping has made his point," said Lam. "Obedience to the party is more important to the party leadership than corruption."

"All this going after big tigers is divisive and causes disunity among the factions, and this is why Xi will not go after Zhou Yongkang."

Bo's leftist revival during his tenure as boss of the southwestern mega-city of Chongqing saw thousands of officials sent to the countryside to get closer to ordinary people, and the staging of mass concerts with "red songs" praising former leader Mao Zedong.

After his downfall, factions in the upper echelons of the Communist Party were reportedly split on how to handle him, and a year and a half passed following his detention before he went on trial.

"Many Chinese people liked Bo for his populist approach to politics and policy," said Mary Gallagher, director of the Center for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan.

"His tendency to look for popular support hurt him with his colleagues, but I think it gave some citizens the taste for more democratic politics."

However, the lurid allegations that captivated the nation only implicated his inner circle and close family, underscoring Beijing's tight control of the legal process.

"We have seen some kind of agreement -- to not touch on intra-party struggles, to not implicate senior leaders -- that certainly shows that the party is still in charge of the judiciary," said Joseph Cheng from the City University of Hong Kong.

 

[Vermin]

Ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai appeals life sentence: source

Men look at a screen displaying a picture of disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai standing trial on the website of a court's microblog, in Jinan, Shandong province September 22, 2013. REUTERS/Aly Song

BEIJING | Mon Sep 23, 2013 8:12am EDT

(Reuters) - Ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai has appealed his life sentence, a source with direct knowledge of the case said.

"He has already appealed," the source said, adding that the appeal process could take up to two months and would be determined by authorities.

Bo, a one-time rising star of China's ruling Communist Party, was sentenced to life in prison for corruption charges on Sunday.

His appeal is unlikely to succeed given that Chinese courts are controlled by the ruling Communist Party.

(Reporting By Michael Martina; Editing by Robert Birsel)