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Zhou Yongkang, Ex-Security Chief in China, Gets Life Sentence for Graft Zhou Yongkang, Ex-Security Chief in China, Gets Life Sentence for Graft
(about 9 hours later)
HONG KONG — Zhou Yongkang, China’s former domestic security chief, was sentenced to life in prison on Thursday for accepting bribes, abuse of power and revealing state secrets, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency reported. HONG KONG — President Xi Jinping of China vowed to hunt “tigers” as well as “flies” in his drive to rid the ruling Communist Party of corruption, and on Thursday he defanged the most dangerous tiger yet — Zhou Yongkang, the nation’s former chief of domestic security.
Mr. Zhou, 72, was tried in secret in the northeastern city of Tianjin. A member of the elite Politburo Standing Committee from 2007 until 2012, he is the most senior leader, sitting or retired, to be sentenced to prison for corruption in more than 65 years of Communist Party rule. Mr. Zhou was convicted of abuse of power, accepting bribes and revealing state secrets, and was sentenced to life in prison. With the verdict, which has been expected since the party first announced last summer that Mr. Zhou was under investigation, Mr. Xi has taken the Chinese political system into uncharted territory.
The life sentence marks the final blow for Mr. Zhou, once considered by many to command more power — through his control of the police and criminal justice system — than anyone except the party’s top leader. The vise around his circle of political allies began to tighten only weeks after Xi Jinping, now China’s president, took the party’s top post in November 2012. Only three years ago, Mr. Zhou sat with Mr. Xi on the nine-member Politburo Standing Committee, which governs the country. Now he is the most senior leader to be jailed for corruption in more than 65 years of Communist rule.
Mr. Zhou was found guilty of accepting about $118,000 in bribes, including money and property from Jiang Jiemin, the jailed former head of China National Petroleum Corporation, a state-owned oil and natural gas company once led by Mr. Zhou. He was also found guilty of leaking six secret documents to a man named Cao Yongzheng. Earlier news reports identified Mr. Cao as a Beijing fortuneteller. His downfall, announced on national television with footage of him pleading guilty in one of the courtrooms he once controlled, follows the purge of a number of other leaders who were once considered untouchable in China, including some of the highest ranking generals in the People’s Liberation Army. With thousands of party officials investigated or jailed in the past two years, there can be little doubt now of the scope or severity of Mr. Xi’s crackdown.
Mr. Zhou’s wife, Jia Xiaoye, as well as Zhou Bin, his son from an earlier marriage, had also taken bribes totaling more than $20 million, Xinhua said. Yet Mr. Xi’s ultimate goal, and his next move, remain uncertain.
The news agency’s report did not say whether Ms. Jia, a former presenter on state television, or Zhou Bin, whose wife is a United States citizen, are also being prosecuted or whether Mr. Zhou’s confession of guilt was made in exchange for leniency for them. Is he determined to press ahead with his popular campaign to cleanse the party of corruption, and risk a backlash from the powerful men and women of the party elite, in the cause of better government for China? Or is he trying to consolidate his hold on power, sidelining old enemies and intimidating potential new ones, after what now appears to have been a bruising succession battle?
The sentencing of Mr. Zhou marks a high point for Mr. Xi’s campaign against corruption in the Communist Party. Just days after assuming control of the party with its more than 80 million members, Mr. Xi said that graft threatened the party’s hold on power. In the past two years, hundreds of thousands of elite cadres and minor officials — or “tigers” and “flies” in party terminology — have found themselves investigated by the party’s internal discipline organization. “This is the point of decision, when he decides whether Zhou Yongkang is the last or the first great tiger,” Roderick MacFarquhar, a professor at Harvard University who focuses on Chinese elite politics, said of Mr. Xi. “I think it’s too early to tell.”
Mr. Zhou was shown on Chinese television bowing his head — his once jet-black hair turned white in confinement — and confessing his crimes. The life sentence is a final blow for Mr. Zhou, who was once seen as the second most powerful figure in the party because he controlled the police and the criminal justice system.
“I obey the verdict the court handed to me. I will not appeal,” Mr. Zhou said. “I acknowledge the fact that I have broken the law and committed crimes, and have caused losses to the party’s work. I, once again, plead guilty, and I repent.” He was found guilty of accepting about $118,000 in bribes, including money and property from Jiang Jiemin, the jailed former head of the state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation.
Prosecutors called the circumstances of his wrongdoing “particularly grave” when they announced charges against him in April. In its verdict, the Tianjin First Intermediate People’s Court said that the bribes were “extremely large” but had been recovered and that the sentence against Mr. Zhou was in accordance with the “degree of harm to society.” He was also found guilty of leaking six secret documents to a man named Cao Yongzheng, who was identified in Chinese news reports as a Beijing fortuneteller.
The dollar amounts mentioned in the verdict were tiny compared to the more than $161 million in documented assets The New York Times found family members to have held in an investigation published last year. Mr. Zhou was shown on Chinese television bowing his head and confessing his crimes, his formerly jet-black hair turned white in confinement.
The Times’s calculation was conservative, in many cases only accounting for the share capital of companies controlled by the family, rather than gross or net assets, which are often unavailable to the public but are usually many times larger than the share capital. According to the official Xinhua News Agency, Mr. Zhou’s wife, Jia Xiaoye, and his son from a former marriage, Zhou Bin, also took bribes totaling more than $20 million. The agency did not say whether they too were being prosecuted, or whether Mr. Zhou’s confession was made in exchange for leniency for them. Zhou Bin’s wife is an American citizen.
It has never been clear to what extent the prosecution of Mr. Zhou and his allies is part of Mr. Xi’s broader anticorruption campaign as opposed to a takedown of a powerful potential rival. “I obey the verdict the court handed to me. I will not appeal,” Mr. Zhou said in the televised confession. “I acknowledge the fact that I have broken the law and committed crimes, and have caused losses to the party’s work. I, once again, plead guilty, and I repent.”
Mr. Zhou’s lawyer, Gu Yongzhong, a professor at China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing, declined to discuss the case when reached by telephone. “I hope you could base your story on the Xinhua statement, which is clear enough. I’ve got nothing to say,” he said. Prosecutors called the circumstances of his wrongdoing “particularly grave” when they announced charges against him in April. In its verdict, the Tianjin First Intermediate People’s Court said that the bribes were “extremely large” and that the sentence was proportional to the “degree of harm to society.”
There had been no indication before the verdict that Mr. Zhou’s trial would take place so soon after the office of the country’s top prosecutor announced that he would be tried. Xinhua, citing the court, said that Mr. Zhou was tried behind closed doors because the case involved charges of leaking state secrets. The head of China’s Supreme Court had been cited in the state news media in March as indicating that the trials of top officials, including Mr. Zhou’s, would be open. The dollar amounts mentioned in the verdict were tiny compared with the Zhou family’s wealth. A New York Times investigation published last year found that the family had documented assets of more than $160 million, a conservative figure that did not include bank accounts, real estate, assets held by proxies or other wealth not reflected in publicly available records.
The fact that the proceedings were held in secret is an indication that Mr. Zhou may have not been cooperative in reaching what was going to be essentially a political verdict, said Steve Tsang, head of contemporary Chinese studies at the University of Nottingham, in response to emailed questions. Because of Mr. Zhou’s high rank, Mr. Tsang said, the outcome would have been agreed upon in advance by top current and former leaders. Several other politically powerful families were found by The Times to have documented assets greater than the Zhous’, including relatives of former Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, the former Beijing party chief Jia Qinglin, and the extended family of Mr. Xi himself. No evidence has come to light indicating that those assets were obtained illegally.
“The verdict and the specifics of the crimes to charge him of are matters too important to be decided by the police, the procurators or the judges,” Mr. Tsang said. “They are highly sensitive and political matters that only the top leadership can decide. They are meant to ‘justify’ the sentence given.” State media in China have suggested in recent weeks that Mr. Xi’s anticorruption campaign may be entering a new phase, with the emphasis shifting to prevention instead of enforcement.
One of the people named in Thursday’s judgment as benefiting from Mr. Zhou’s corruption, Li Chuncheng, the former deputy Communist Party secretary in Sichuan Province, was removed from his post in December 2012, only weeks after Mr. Xi took over the party’s top post. In the months that followed, other members of Mr. Zhou’s inner circle, including Mr. Jiang, the former head of the China National Petroleum Corporation, were removed from their posts and prosecuted for corruption. Andrew Wedeman, a professor of political science at Georgia State University whose research is on corruption in China, said in a telephone interview that he saw evidence of the campaign slowing down. Moreover, he said, continuing to prosecute high-ranking people like Mr. Zhou could cause the party lasting damage.
It is not clear what prompted the authorities to turn so quickly against Mr. Zhou, but in March the Supreme Court provided tantalizing evidence that suggested that Mr. Zhou’s transgressions went far beyond bribery and giving documents to fortunetellers. “You do need some way of striking the balance,” Mr. Wedeman said. “You can’t keep indicting more and more tigers without really calling into question the integrity of the party as a whole. There is a need at some point to scale things back.”
The court said in a report on judicial work that Mr. Zhou and Bo Xilai — a former Politburo member who was tried and convicted in 2013 — had “trampled on rule of law, sabotaged party unity and engaged in nonorganization political activities.” The wording suggested that Mr. Zhou and Mr. Bo had, together or separately, engaged in political conspiracy. Mr. Zhou’s lawyer, Gu Yongzhong, declined to discuss the case. “I hope you could base your story on the Xinhua statement, which is clear enough,” he said when reached by telephone. “I’ve got nothing to say.”
The head of China’s Supreme Court indicated in March that the trials of top officials would be open, but Xinhua said the trial court decided to try Mr. Zhou behind closed doors because of the state-secrets charge. Steve Tsang, head of contemporary Chinese studies at the University of Nottingham, said in an email that the secrecy may also signal that Mr. Zhou was not cooperating with the authorities in a trial whose outcome was preordained. Mr. Tsang said that because of Mr. Zhou’s rank, top current and former leaders would have agreed on a verdict before the trial began.
The charges against him were “matters too important to be decided by the police, the procurators or the judges,” Mr. Tsang said. “They are highly sensitive and political matters that only the top leadership can decide.”
One of the people that the court said had benefited from Mr. Zhou’s corruption was Li Chuncheng, the former deputy Communist Party secretary in Sichuan Province, who was cashiered in December 2012, a few weeks after Mr. Xi took over the party’s top post. Other close associates of Mr. Zhou’s inner circle, including Mr. Jiang, the former oil and gas executive, were removed from their posts and prosecuted for corruption in the months that followed.
The Xinhua report said that Mr. Zhou worked with Mr. Jiang and Mr. Li to bring benefits to Mr. Zhou’s relatives and other people amounting to $345 million.
It is not clear what prompted the authorities to turn so quickly against Mr. Zhou. In March, though, the Supreme Court suggested that Mr. Zhou’s transgressions went far beyond bribery and leaking documents to fortune tellers.
In a report on judicial work, the Supreme Court said Mr. Zhou and Bo Xilai — a former Politburo member who was tried and convicted in 2013 — had “trampled on the rule of law, sabotaged party unity and engaged in nonorganization political activities.” That wording suggested that Mr. Zhou and Mr. Bo had, together or separately, engaged in political conspiracy.