Chinese former senior official gets life in jail

A Chinese court has handed down a life sentence to the former deputy head of the country’s top planning agency for his role in a high-level bribery scandal.

The court verdict was issued Wednesday against Liu Tienan, who was dismissed last year as the deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), a ministerial-level post.

During the sentencing, the presiding judge in the court of Langfang city in Hebei Province stated that Liu had “violated the integrity of the duties of the nation’s workers.”

Sixty-year-old Liu pleaded guilty to widespread bribery schemes that involved a number of major corporations, including Japanese automaker Toyota Motor Corp., back in September.

Chinese prosecutors had charged Liu and his son, Liu Decheng, with taking 35.6 million yuan (5.8 million dollars) in bribes from various corporate establishments.

The case against Liu marked the first time a ministerial-level official faced a government probe after Chinese President Xi Jinping became the head of the Communist Party in late 2012 and launched the most aggressive anti-graft campaign in the nation’s recent history.

Xi has vowed to take down high-ranking “tigers” and low-ranking “flies” in his battle against a persistent dilemma that he believes could threaten the rule of his country’s Communist Party.

The Chinese government has also launched a series of investigations into the energy sector that has taken down senior authorities at the National Energy Administration and the state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation.