UPDATE 2-Ex-chairman of China Huarong Asset Management sentenced to death
BEIJING, Jan 5- The former chairman of China Huarong Asset Management Co has been sentenced to death, a court in the northern city of Tianjin said on Tuesday, in one of the country’s highest profile corruption cases. Lai Xiaomin was convicted of receiving or seeking bribes totalling 1.788 billion yuan from 2008 to 2018, when he was also a senior banking regulator,…
BEIJING, Jan 5 (Reuters) – The former chairman of China
Huarong Asset Management Co has been sentenced to
death, a court in the northern city of Tianjin said on Tuesday,
in one of the country’s highest profile corruption cases.
Lai Xiaomin was convicted of receiving or seeking bribestotalling 1.788 billion yuan ($276.72 million) from 2008 to2018, when he was also a senior banking regulator, according tothe Secondary Intermediate People’s Court of Tianjin.
Lai, who was expelled from the ruling Communist Party in2018, was also convicted on a charge of bigamy.
Reuters was unable to contact Lai or his lawyer for comment.
“Lai Xiaomin was lawless and extremely greedy,” the courtstatement said.
Huarong said its Communist Party committee supports theverdict.
“The severe treatment of Lai Xiaomin reflects the strongdetermination of the Central Committee with President Xi Jinpingas the core to administer the party and its zero tolerance inpunishing corruption,” the company said in a statement.
The court noted that most of the activity in question tookplace after the 18th Party Congress in late 2012, referring toan event that sparked a sweeping anti-corruption campaign bysoon-to-be President Xi Jinping that became a hallmark of hisfirst term.
“The social harm was huge and the crimes were extremelyserious and he should be severely punished according to law,”the court said.($1 = 6.4614 Chinese yuan renminbi)(Reporting by Gabriel Crossley, Stella Qiu and Cheng LengEditing by Andrew Heavens, Raju Gopalakrishnan and DavidGoodman)