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Bill Savadove

Shanghai had 402 cases of official corruption involving 459 people last year, including executives from subsidiaries of two big state-owned firms, Sinopec and Baosteel Group.

According to excerpts from the annual report of the Shanghai prosecutor's office published  yesterday, 249 cases of corruption or misuse of  funds involved state companies.

Cases included that of the former manager of Sinopec's Shanghai subsidiary, Song Jianfeng , who accepted 300,000 yuan in bribes. The former manager of Baosteel's equipment inspection and repair company, Tang Zhiyong, and three other employees accepted a total 4.6 million yuan in bribes.

Shanghai snared 77 government officials above the level of department deputy director for corruption last year.

They included the deputy head of the Hongkou district public health department, Gu Xinhui , held over  a 130,000 yuan corruption case, and the head of the accounting office in Jichang town, Wang Linchuan, held in connection with a 600,000 yuan case.

The city also had 37 cases of officials shirking their duties or abusing their powers, the report said.

Of all the corruption cases, 88 per cent involved bribes of more than 50,000 yuan or the misuse  of more than 100,000 yuan in public funds. Shanghai prosecutors handled a total of 13,697 cases last year, up more than 15 per cent from 2003.

Delivering the report to local lawmakers last Thursday, the head of the Shanghai People's Procuratorate, Wu Guangyu , urged efforts be made to prevent corruption in the relocation of residents from the  site of the 2010 World Expo.

'In the course of relocation work, it is easy to encounter a link between duty and crime,' he said. Officials are predicting more residents will need relocating for the expo than for any other  single development project in the city's modern history.

Shanghai aims to limit the number of families relocated this year to 60,000, up from 55,400 families moved last year, official figures show.

The Shanghai's Higher People's Court said city courts handled 256,500 cases last year.  Commercial-related cases rose more than 5 per cent, to 157,000.



Battle against official graft nets 459 in Shanghai last year