Bo Xilai, the disgraced former Communist Party official, was indicted on Thursday on criminal charges of bribery, corruption and abuse of power, paving the way for a prominent trial expected to start within weeks.
China set a timeline for the prosecution of disgraced Politburo member Bo Xilai, moving to resolve a scandal that overshadowed a once-in-a-decade transfer of power and tested the unity of new Communist Party leaders.
The new directive, which bans the construction of government buildings for the next five years, showed clear signs of being a continuation of the anticorruption campaign, describing the ban as “important for building a clean government” and improving the ties between the party and the people.
The indictment accuses Mr. Bo of taking advantage of his position "to seek profits for others" and accepting an "extremely large amount" in money and property, Xinhua said. "He also embezzled a huge amount of public money and abused his power, seriously harming the interests of the state and people."
All eyes will be watching for signs of détente over North Korea’s nuclear-weapons program when Chinese Vice President Li Yuanchao becomes the highest-ranking among China’s new leadership to visit Pyongyang this week.
After almost three years of podcasting, this week on Sinica we bow to the inevitable with a show about Chinese cuisine, and in particular the strange history of pasta in China. Joining us for this journey is Jen Lin-Liu, author of On the Noodle Road: From Beijing to Rome, with Love and Pasta. Joining her in our studio is Sinica regular David Moser, Academic Director of CET Beijing and our go-to man for restaurant recommendations in Beijing.
If the law sets a criminal to catch other criminals what do you think those criminals will think? My colleagues have discovered that new legislation threatens to do just that.
Spring Air, China's biggest low-cost carrier, will begin flights between Shanghai and the southern Taiwanese port city of Kaohsiung in August, with Shanghai-Taipei service starting before year's end, Chairman Wang Zhenghua said Tuesday. Wang said it took five years to get clearance for the flights from authorities, underscoring the difficulties competing with China's established state-run carriers on high-profile routes.
Andrew Witty, chief executive of the drug maker GlaxoSmithKline, said on Wednesday that the accusations of bribery and corruption against his company in China were “deeply disappointing.” But he said that Glaxo’s headquarters in London had not been aware of any fraud and that the executives under scrutiny in China were working “outside of our system of controls.”
China's official news agency hinted that more foreign pharmaceutical firms could soon be implicated in a corruption scandal sweeping the industry, in the wake of bribery accusations against British drug maker GlaxoSmithKline. Corruption in China's pharmaceutical industry is fuelled in part by the low base salaries for doctors at the country's 13,500 public hospitals.
