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China’s former security chief given life sentence for corruption China’s former security chief given life sentence for corruption
(about 2 hours later)
China’s former security chief and the arch-rival of president Xi Jinping has been sentenced to life in prison following a secret trial. China’s former security chief and the arch-rival of president Xi Jinping has been sentenced to life in prison for corruption following a secret trial.
Zhou Yongkang – one of the Communist party’s most powerful and feared figures until his retirement in 2012 – was a key adversary of the Chinese leader and some experts had predicted he would be executed for his alleged crimes.Zhou Yongkang – one of the Communist party’s most powerful and feared figures until his retirement in 2012 – was a key adversary of the Chinese leader and some experts had predicted he would be executed for his alleged crimes.
Related: Zhou Yongkang: oil boss who became China's third most powerful manRelated: Zhou Yongkang: oil boss who became China's third most powerful man
Following a secret trial Zhou, 72, was convicted of bribery, abuse of power and leaking state secrets, Xinhua, China’s official news agency, announced on Thursday afternoon. “Zhou pleaded guilty and will not appeal,” Xinhua reported. Following the closed-door trial, the 72-year-old was convicted of bribery, abuse of power and leaking state secrets, Xinhua, China’s official news agency, announced.
Zhou was convicted of taking 129m yuan (£13.4m) worth of bribes as well as leaking “top secret files”, Xinhua added. His trial, which was held in the north-eastern city of Tianjin, around 80 miles from Beijing, began on 22 May. He is the most senior Communist party figure ever to have been convicted of such charges.
Xi, who became Communist party chief in late 2012 just as Zhou stepped down, has been portrayed as China’s most powerful and authoritarian leader since Mao Zedong. “I realise the harm I have caused to the party and to the people,” a silver-haired Zhou told the court, according to CCTV, the state broadcaster.
“I broke the law and party rules incessantly and the objective facts of my crimes have resulted in grave losses to the party and the nation,” he added, according to Xinhua.
Zhou’s trial, which was held about 80 miles from Beijing in the north-eastern city of Tianjin, began on 22 May but was only revealed on Thursday evening.
The fallen Communist party titan was convicted of taking 129m yuan (£13.4m) worth of bribes as well as leaking “top secret files”, Xinhua reported.
While Zhou had taken “particularly huge bribes”, he had also “truthfully confessed, pleaded guilty and repented his wrongdoing when brought to justice”, the court said.
The son of an eel farmer, Zhou was born in Jiangsu province in 1942, seven years before Mao Zedong’s Communist troops swept to power.
He joined the party in 1964 and forged a successful career in the oil industry, eventually becoming the general manager of CNPC, the state-run energy giant. Some knew him as China’s Dick Cheney.
Zhou went on to reach the highest echelons of the Communist party.
He was named minister for public security in 2002 and then head of the party’s political and legislative affairs committee, giving him control over China’s courts, police and secret police. His position at the helm of the country’s feared security apparatus meant he was widely loathed by human rights activists but also immensely powerful. In 2007 he became one of nine members of the elite politburo standing committee, the body that rules China, a position he held until his retirement in 2012.
By then, Zhou’s future appeared to be in jeopardy. He was last seen in public in October 2013, amid frantic speculation that his purge was imminent.
Zhou was eventually indicted on corruption charges in April this year, after months under house arrest.
Xi, who became Communist party chief in late 2012 just as Zhou stepped down, has been portrayed as China’s most powerful and authoritarian leader since Mao Zedong. Xi has been waging a high-profile war on corruption, vowing to eliminate thieving “tigers and flies” from the Communist party.
Some experts described the verdict as a victory for a president Chinese spin doctors call “Xi Dada”, which translates as Uncle or Big Daddy Xi.
However, Steve Tsang, an expert on Chinese politics from the University of Nottingham, said Beijing’s decision to try Zhou in secret suggested Xi was not as dominant as some observers suggest.However, Steve Tsang, an expert on Chinese politics from the University of Nottingham, said Beijing’s decision to try Zhou in secret suggested Xi was not as dominant as some observers suggest.
“He is still powerful, he is still confident – but not as much as we were all giving him credit for,” he said. Xi has been waging a high-profile war on corruption, vowing to eliminate thieving “tigers and flies” from the Communist party. “He is still powerful, he is still confident – but not as much as we were all giving him credit for,” Tsang said.
But much of the explanation for Zhou’s downfall was political, Tsang said. Xi would have seen his rival as a major obstacle preventing him from asserting “his supremacy within the party”. Communist party leaders appeared to have struck a “political deal” with Zhou, said Wu Qiang, a politics professor from Beijing’s Tsinghua University.
“Judging from the fact that Zhou has decided not to appeal and from his final statements, the trial could be understood as a pre-arranged political deal.”
Striking such an agreement was probably intended to spare Communist party’s blushes, said Zhang Lifan, a prominent and outspoken Beijing-based historian.
As the former head of China’s domestic spy network, “Zhou might hold the secrets of many VIPs which he could be use as his bargain chips,” said Zhang.
Xi has made the fight against corruption a key theme of his presidency, vowing to drive thieving “tigers” such as Zhou from the party.
But the decision to topple Zhou was largely a political one, said Tsang, who claimed that Xi saw the former security tsar as an obstacle, preventing him from asserting “his supremacy within the party”.
“We don’t know what Xi Jinping wants to do in China yet but we do know that he is ambitious. We do know that he wants to leave a mark.”“We don’t know what Xi Jinping wants to do in China yet but we do know that he is ambitious. We do know that he wants to leave a mark.”
The court said Zhou had accepted its decision and would not file an appeal. While the charges potentially mandated a death sentence, it said Zhou received leniency after confessing and showing repentance and ordering his relatives to hand over the majority of their ill-gotten gains. Additional reporting by Luna Lin
Zhou is the highest-ranking former politician to face court since the 1981 treason trial of Mao Zedong’s wife and other members of the “Gang of Four” who persecuted political opponents during the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution.
The dour-faced and once-feared Zhou had been under investigation since late 2013, and has been unavailable for comment since then. The investigation also scrutinized Zhou’s former allies in government and the oil industry.
Zhou was once seen as untouchable, with a vast patronage network covering the southwestern province of Sichuan where he used to be party boss to the state oil sector, police and courts.
He spent the early part of his career in the oil industry, rising through the ranks over several decades to become the general manager of China National Petroleum Corp, one of the world’s biggest energy companies, in 1996.
A series of senior figures from the state-owned oil industry have been detained in the anti-corruption crackdown.
Additional reporting by Luna Lin and agencies