Caixin Media
02.29.16Former Energy Official Says Police Tortured Him into Confessing
A former deputy director of National Energy Administration (NEA) on trial for taking bribes has pleaded not guilty because he says the charges are based on a false confession that was extracted via torture and intimidation, according to a person who...
Media
01.29.16‘I Don't Want to Think About Activating Change’
from Asia Blog
In 2012, The New York Times published a groundbreaking investigative report showing that the family of Wen Jiabao, China’s then-prime minister, possessed wealth in excess of $2.7 billion. In response, the Chinese government blocked the Times’...
Viewpoint
01.28.16The Trouble with Hong Kong’s Chief Executives
On January 14, the trial of Sir Donald Tsang, Hong Kong’s former chief executive who served from 2005 to 2012, was set for January 3 of 2017. This past December, Tsang pleaded not guilty to two counts of misconduct in public office, charges on which...
ChinaFile Recommends
01.19.16Wang Qishan, China’s Anti-Corruption Tsar
Financial Times
The anti-corruption drive has been the central policy of this administration and its duration and severity have surprised almost everyone, not least the bureaucrats who have been its primary targets.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.14.16China Vows to Keep High Pressure on Corruption
Xinhua
The Communist Party of China will maintain a heavy-handed approach against corruption, “with unabated forces and unchanging rhythm.”
Caixin Media
01.04.16How a Beijing Traffic Cop Lined His Pockets
After rising from beat cop to Beijing traffic manager, Song Jianguo used his position to trade favors for nearly 24 million yuan in cash and gold
ChinaFile Recommends
12.24.15Monthly Data Details China’s Anti-Corruption Campaign
China Economic Review
Data “supports the hypothesis that the pace of the corruption crackdown has slowed in quantity, but that the investigators are having more success in gaining prosecutions.”
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12.14.15China Suspends Death Sentence for Wife of Disgraced Official
Time
The murder of British businessman Neil Heywood sparked one of China's biggest political scandals.
ChinaFile Recommends
12.11.15China’s Anti-Corruption Cases Have Quadrupled Since 2013
WSJ: China Real Time Report
In Chinese business and political circles, conversations frequently return to a familiar question: When will President Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign end?
Caixin Media
10.27.15Does the Punishment Fit the Corruption?
After Chen Bokui, the deputy head of a government advisory body in the central province of Hubei, was convicted of taking 2.8 million yuan in bribes by a court in the eastern province of Fujian in April, he received a somewhat stiff sentence—17...
Media
09.28.15What’s China’s Mood Under Xi? New Data Gives a Glimpse
China, under the presidency of Xi Jinping, has invited a number of breathless pronouncements about the state of the country. Chinese media regularly conjure the “Chinese Dream,” one of Xi’s favored phrases, which means whatever readers want it to...
Caixin Media
09.22.15Chinese Contractor Finds Project in Bahamas Is No Day at Beach
A giant luxury resort planned on a beach outside the Bahamas’ capital, Nassau, that is supposed to be a showpiece to help China’s largest construction company tap the U.S. market has become a headache for both its builder and a lender.The resort was...
Caixin Media
08.11.15Auditors Probe Sinopec, Savvy Broker in Angola
Government auditors are taking a closer look at U.S.$10 billion worth of offshore oil investments by state-run China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (Sinopec) that owe their existence to a Hong Kong businessman with a flair for networking in the...
The China Africa Project
08.11.15China’s Role in Africa’s ‘Looting Machine’
China goes to great lengths to differentiate its engagement in Africa from the continent’s former European colonizers by emphasizing so-called “win-win development.” Chinese leaders regularly visit Africa where they emphatically reject the...
Environment
08.05.15High-Ranking Retired Environmental Protection Official Mired in Corruption Probe
from chinadialogue
Retired Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) Vice Minister Zhang Lijun has run afoul of the ongoing corruption crackdown, becoming the highest-ranking environmental official yet to be investigated.On Thursday, China’s anti-corruption watchdog...
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07.22.15China Probes Senior Xinjiang Security Official For Graft
Reuters
A deputy regional security chief and former head of the prison system, Xie Hui, in Xinjiang has been put under investigation for suspected corruption.
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06.25.15China Reveals Misuse of $2.7 Billion in Lottery Funds
Reuters
China uncovered the misappropriation of $2.72 billion from its state lottery program, used to buy and build office buildings and hotels.
Media
06.11.15Zhou Yongkang’s Mask of Fear Falls Quietly Away
Zhou Yongkang—erstwhile oil czar, former chief of China’s dreaded state security apparatus, a man once swaggering and fit enough to perform 50 to 100 pushups in front of fawning onlookers—has completed his transformation into a sad historical...
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06.10.15ChinaFile Recommends
06.05.15Survivor Accounts Raise Questions About Yangtze Ship’s Final Moments
New York Times
Four days after the ship, the Oriental Star, flipped over in a ferocious storm, leaving 442 dead or missing.
Caixin Media
05.26.15Time for Reform Advocates to Step to the Fore
As the reform of China’s economy and society deepens, attention is turning to the people tasked with the job of spearheading and carrying out change. Thus, it was gratifying to hear the call by President Xi Jinping, made at the 12th meeting of the...
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05.26.15Sex Trade Goes Underground in China’s ‘Sin City’
CNN
More than 2,000 hotels, saunas and massage parlors were shut down in Dongguan.
The China Africa Project
05.21.15The Dark Side of Chinese Investment in Africa
Sam Pa is a mysterious man, largely unknown to the outside world. Yet Pa, who goes by at least seven different aliases, represents the nefarious side of China’s engagement in Africa. Sam Pa and his associates in the Hong Kong-based consortium known...
Media
04.28.15Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Chinese Fugitives
Meet China’s 100 international most-wanted: a history professor, a driving instructor, and a government propaganda office cashier. Chinese graft-busters want you to know that one of them might be your neighbor.On April 22, China’s dreaded Central...
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04.28.15Wang Jianlin, a Billionaire at the Intersection of Business and Power in China -
New York Times
Wang tends to present himself as the pragmatic face of big business in China.
Caixin Media
04.22.15China’s Anti-Corruption Drive: Don’t Stop Now
Beijing’s fight against corruption is now two years old. Some significant results have been achieved, winning strong public support. But it’s becoming increasingly difficult to move the campaign forward.The general public and government officials...
Caixin Media
04.14.15Bulldozing the Cadre Who Revamped Kunming
Warm, sunny Kunming brimmed with charm before Communist Party leader Qiu He brought an autocratic style of governance to town and spurred the urbanization campaign that preceded his downfall.Today, this historic city in southwestern China is a...
Caixin Media
04.06.15Tycoon Said to Bring Down a Deputy Mayor, Control Key Beijing Land Deal
A recent business dispute between a state-owned technology conglomerate and a private property developer has put a low-profile but powerful businessman in the spotlight. The businessman is believed to have brought down a former Beijing deputy mayor...
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03.16.15Was News of Xu Caihou’s Death Buried?
South China Morning Post
Speculation mounts on demise of former PLA general.
ChinaFile Recommends
03.16.15Qiu He, top Yunnan Official, Ousted for Corrupt Land Deals
East by Southeast
Qiu was the catalyst for a swath of controversial infrastructure projects, including a new international airport finished in 2012.
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03.13.15China’s Growing Middle Class Chafes Against Red Tape
New York Times
As China’s middle class—wired, ambitious and worldly—grows, its members increasingly are intolerant.
ChinaFile Recommends
03.10.15Henan Delegates Protest Inequality in University Admissions
New York Times
Henan people say big cities are given preferential consideration for education funds and places in universities.
The China Africa Project
02.19.15Is Chinese Corporate Behavior Improving in Africa?
The list of grievances against Chinese companies operating in Africa is long and varied, from violations of labor rights to environmental destruction to widespread allegations of corruption. Although it is hard to tell how many companies are truly...
Media
02.19.15Why 700 Million People Keep Watching the Chinese New Year Gala, Even Though It’s Terrible
The Chinese New Year Gala, which aired live on February 18 on Chinese Central Television (CCTV), is a four-and-half hour variety show with song and dance, comedic skits, magic tricks, acrobatic acts, and celebrity cameos. The show celebrates the...
Sinica Podcast
02.16.15Business and F*cking in China
from Sinica Podcast
This week's show starts with us grilling James on "what you have to do to be part of Chinese business culture" and descends from there into stories of the sort of booze-and-ketamine-fuelled business deal-making that seems to consist...
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02.11.15Exclusive: U.S., China to Discuss Repatriation of Chinese Fugitives
Reuters
The issue is a thorny one, as no extradition treaty exists between the U.S. and China.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.09.15China Executes ‘Mafia-style’ Mining Tycoon Liu Han
BBC
Liu is believed to have had links to former security tsar Zhou Yongkang, who is currently being investigated.
Postcard
02.04.15The Bro Code
Turning down an after-dinner invite to a brothel is always a social minefield. But the city’s Party Secretary, a 50-something man with baby-soft hands, had been gently fondling my thigh underneath the banquet table for the past 45 minutes, making me...
Caixin Media
02.03.15Minsheng Bank President Resigns Amid Corruption Investigation
China Minsheng Banking Corp. said on January 31 that its president has resigned, shortly after people close to the matter said the Communist Party is investigating him for corruption.Minsheng said in a statement that Mao Xiaofeng had quit as...
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01.30.15China Expels Top Police Official from Communist Party
Reuters
Cai Guangliao, a major general in the paramilitary armed police, accepted bribes, illegally engaging in business activities and accepting gifts.
Features
01.28.15‘I Don’t Know Where Some Cadres Get Their Magical Powers’
Earlier this month, at the close of the Chinese Communist Party’s 5th Plenum, the official People’s Daily noted on its website that as this important agenda-setting meeting came to a close it was worth paying attention to the recent publication of a...
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01.27.15Chinese Sports Authorities Map Out Measures in Fight Against Corruption and Match-fixing
Xinhua
Chinese sports authorities have vowed to stamp out corruption and match-fixing.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.25.15Death Threats and Dawn Raids: Welcome to China’s Anti-Graft Drive
Bloomberg
On one side is Peking University Founder Group, a state-owned company that partnered with Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN) in a separate securities joint venture whose chairman has disappeared.
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01.22.15China Says Ousted Security Tsar’s Influence Corrupted Others
Reuters
Last year, China arrested Zhou and expelled him from the party, accusing him of crimes ranging from taking bribes to leaking state secrets.
Media
01.22.15Xi Jinping’s Pay Raise
It just got slightly less difficult to be a clean Chinese official. State media reported on January 20 that Chinese civil servants had received their first pay raise in ten years, a move that includes a 60 percent bump for President Xi Jinping and...
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01.08.15China Wants Taxes Paid by Citizens Living Afar
New York Times
As Chinese individuals and companies head overseas in greater numbers, the country’s tax authorities are starting to follow.
Caixin Media
12.30.14Nephew of Disgraced Official Ling Jihua Involved in Tangled Web of Businesses
The investigations into Ling Jihua, Vice Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and his two brothers, Ling Zhengce and Ling Wancheng, have shed light on a powerful family that had a grip on both government resources...
Infographics
12.05.14China’s Fallen Mighty [Graphic]
Over the past thirty-eight years, twelve of China’s top leaders have been purged. This infographic and the bios of these leaders explain how and why these mighty men fell. Download the high-resolution graphic.
Features
12.05.14China’s Fallen Mighty [Updated]
Political infighting and purges have been hallmarks of the Chinese Communist Party since its earliest days but came to a peak during Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, damaging the country and paralyzing the Party itself. When Mao died in 1976, it...
Sinica Podcast
11.22.14Banned but Booming: Golf in China
from Sinica Podcast
Despite China's legal moratorium on the development of the golf industry, a policy driven by concerns over illegal farmland seizures and the potential misallocation of agricultural land and water resources, the golf industry has experienced an...
Infographics
11.20.14Who Really Benefits from Poverty Alleviation in China?
from Sohu
A series of reports issued by China's National Audit Office highlights problems in 19 counties that have received funding from national poverty alleviation programs. News of "impoverished counties’" constructing luxurious new...
Environment
11.07.14China’s EIA Industry Rife with Fraud
from chinadialogue
A farce played out at an environmental impact assessment (EIA) firm in the southern city of Shenzhen when inspectors called round in early October, this year.The firm had applied to renew its license to carry out EIAs—reports that are supposed to...
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11.03.14China Officials “Buy Corpses to Meet Cremation Quota”
BBC
Two officials in Guangdong province have been arrested after they allegedly bought corpses from grave robbers to have them cremated, Chinese media say.
ChinaFile Recommends
11.03.14Tigers and Flies
South China Morning Post
The South China Morning Post has collected the CCDI’s announcements of graft probes since the beginning of Xi’s reign two years ago, and visualised them on a map. Party probes have spread across China and dramatically intensified since early 2014.
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10.31.14AFP Follows Chinese Fugitive Money Trail
Agence France-Presse
The son of China’s most famous fugitive spent the five years before his father was placed under investigation for corruption setting up two Australian companies and buying a development site in Sydney’s Neutral Bay.
Caixin Media
10.27.14Rise and Fall of a Coal Boomtown
Some 187 kilometers west of Taiyuan, capital of the northern province of Shanxi, the city of Luliang is located on the dry and gullied Loess Plateau in the upper and middle reaches of the Yellow River.The city, which covers 21,143 square kilometers...
The China Africa Project
09.30.14China and ‘The Battle for Africa’
Al Jazeera stands alone among the major international news channels in its regular coverage of the Chinese in Africa. In the network’s latest documentary released in September 2014, veteran Sierra Leonean journalist Sorious Samura hosts “The Battle...
The China Africa Project
09.20.14Sam Pa, China’s Mysterious Middleman in Africa
Publicly, China's engagement in Africa is purportedly based on “mutual benefit” or, as Chinese officials like to phrase it “win win.” Behind the scenes, though, it's a little more complicated. Many of those multibillion-dollar natural...
ChinaFile Recommends
09.12.14Journalists in China Describe Extortion
New York Times
China’s corporate landscape is pitted with scandals involving corruption and news media have become a part of the problem by turning self-censorship and skewed reporting into a source of revenue.