A top budget official from Beijing was sentenced to life imprisonment by a Henan court yesterday for taking more than 7 million yuan (HK$8 million) in bribes, Xinhua reported.

Zhu Zhigang - a former director of the Commission for Budget Affairs of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress - was convicted by the Xinyang Intermediate People's Court for taking 7.44 million yuan in bribes between January 2000 and March 2008 when he was an assistant finance minister.

The court said Zhu, as a public servant, had demanded bribes from others. Although he returned all the money after the case was exposed, the court deemed the circumstances serious enough to deprive Zhu of his political rights for life and confiscate all his assets.