An investigation into alleged graft by the former director of the PLA's Intelligence Department is finished and has been submitted to prosecutors by the Central Military Commission's chairman, President Jiang Zemin. In addition to the court martial Major-General Ji Shengde is facing, he will be tried for embezzling public funds, taking bribes and dereliction of duty. According to a report by the Economic Information Daily, Ji illegally acquired more than 100 million yuan (HK$93 million). This included 20 million yuan privately embezzled through stock speculation on a PLA-owned company, money accumulated through 'unfair means' in Hong Kong and abroad, and accepting 30 million yuan in bribes from Lai Changxing, who headed the Xiamen Yuanhua smuggling and bribery operation. In the Xiamen case, about 50 billion yuan was smuggled by corrupt officials including Ji. The case was so serious that two officials received death sentences, and Premier Zhu Rongji, Vice-President Hu Jintao and Central Discipline Inspection Commission secretary Wei Jianxing have been handling the case. Despite the severity of Ji's alleged crimes, the newspaper reported he was not expected to face the death penalty, both because his father, Ji Pengfei, was a party elder and his mother is still alive. Public speculation that Ji Shengde was in trouble started in late February, after he failed to appear at his father's official state funeral. The case against Ji is so serious that the report said Mr Jiang had pulled the Military Discipline Inspection Commission out of what had been its joint investigation with the Central Discipline Investigation Commission, when he was not satisfied with the former's progress in the case. Meanwhile, banking bigwig Jin Deqin has lost his appeal to the Supreme Court of the People against the life sentence he received last month. The China Daily reported that the most serious of Jin's embezzlements was in 1990 when, as chairman of Ka Wah bank, he illegally deposited US$4.34 million (HK$33.6 million) of a US$30 million loan by the Chinese Government into his personal bank account. According to authorities, he pilfered substantial amounts over the years. By 1995 he had amassed HK$39.32 million and US$1.59 million in his bank account. Jin was placed under investigation in June 1998, and was first sentenced during a public hearing by the Beijing No 2 Intermediate People's Court on June 2. Jin was deprived of his political rights for life. During his years as a financial chief he served as the Bank of China's president, headed the central bank's overseas business for several decades, was deputy chairman of the China International Trust and Investment Corporation, and was chairman of Hong Kong's Ka Wah Bank.
