China's Communist Party is struggling to guard against corruption: graft-buster
Wang Qishan also rules out chance of independent judiciary in wide-ranging interview with Stanford scholars
More than two years into the mainland's sweeping anti-corruption crackdown and the country's top graft-buster has admitted that the Communist Party is struggling to guard against graft in its ranks, saying it is like a doctor operating on himself.
"There is huge pressure for the long-term ruling party to supervise and purify itself," Wang Qishan was quoted as saying in an article written by Tatsuhito Tokuchi, former general manager of Citic Securities.
Tokuchi and two Stanford University academics, including political scientist Francis Fukuyama, attended a meeting with Wang in Zhongnanhai - the government's headquarters - on April 23.
The article was posted on WeChat by 21ccom.net a website for articles by academics and commentators. Tsinghua University's Centre for Industrial Development and Environmental Governance confirmed to the South China Morning Post that the article was written by Tokuchi, who is a member of the centre's council.
Wang cited the rare case of a Russian surgeon removing his own appendix to illustrate the difficulty of "self-renewal" and "self-purification".
"We realise that it is only a beginning … and we need to keep going," he was quoted as saying.
The anti-corruption campaign, launched by President Xi Jinping shortly after he came to power in late 2012, has expelled both senior and low-ranking officials.