Fujian leaders were summoned to Beijing over the Yuan Hua smuggling scandal in a sign of the seriousness with which it is viewed in the capital, sources said.
Fujian Party Secretary Chen Mingyi and Governor Xi Jinping were called before the top four members of the Politburo Standing Committee - President Jiang Zemin, Premier Zhu Rongji, Vice-President Hu Jintao and Wei Jianxing who heads the anti-graft body, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.
'They were asked [by the leaders] to sum up the experience and learn their lessons from the Yuan Hua smuggling case,' a source said.
The meetings further signalled Beijing's intention to wrap up the investigations into the scandal, which has involved more than 160 Fujian, central Government and military officials.
The scandal was exposed last year when investigators - led by the commission's Deputy Secretary Liu Liying - discovered that the Yuan Hua, or Fairwell Group, in the Fujian city of Xiamen had allegedly smuggled billions of dollars worth of goods to the mainland.
As many as 400 investigators have been assigned to the case because of its complexity.
The sources said that the senior leaders were alarmed over the gravity of the scandal.