China’s military authority on Monday released a list of 14 generals who are under investigation or have been convicted of graft, including the son of one of China’s once highest-ranking generals.
The generals were the latest prominent officers to fall under Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) sweeping anticorruption campaign.
Published on the official Web site of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) three days before the National People’s Congress is to convene for its annual meeting in Beijing, the list identifies a raft of leading officers, the majority of whom are in the political and logistics departments of the military, navy, missile corps and other branches.
The investigators’ focus on military bureaucracy highlights two distinct types of corruption that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) believes undermine military readiness, experts say: bribery in political departments relating to the sale of positions; and embezzlement within logistics departments, which handle large amounts of money as well as contracts.
Among those being investigated is Rear Admiral Guo Zhenggang (郭正鋼), the son of Guo Boxiong (郭伯雄), the retired vice chairman of the Chinese Central Military Commission, which oversees the 2.3 million members of the military.
Guo Zhenggang, 45, the deputy political commissar of military command in Zhejiang Province, was put under investigation last month, suspected of “serious legal violations and criminal offenses,” a common official euphemism for corruption.
He had just been promoted to a major general in January.
In what appeared to be a well-timed media campaign coordinated to discredit the admiral, the investigative magazine Caijing published online a long expose of his family’s allegedly corrupt land dealings — 10 minutes after the list of generals was released.
According to the article, Guo Boxiong’s wife and mother-in-law were sued by investors after their real-estate company took in more than 500 million yuan (US$79 million) to build a five-story hardware market that was never completed.
Speculation that members of the Guo family were being investigated on corruption charges has swirled for months, despite Beijing’s attempts to keep their names off social media sites.
“Guo Boxiong himself is in trouble and is being investigated,” a source with ties to the military told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“The announcement about his son was a message” to the public about the father’s probe, the source added, without elaborating.
Guo Boxiong has not officially been accused of corruption, but last year he was rumored to have tried to flee the nation dressed in women’s clothing.
Although there was no proof verifying the rumor, censors quickly blocked search terms like “Guo + dress in drag” on Sina Weibo, according to China Digital Times, a Web site based in Berkeley, California.
Additional reporting by Reuters
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