INTENSIFYING its crackdown on corruption, China yesterday executed three middle-ranking provincial government officials for ''graft and accepting huge bribes''.
The executions were announced by the vice-president of the Supreme Court, Liu Jiachen, at a specially-convened press conference in Beijing designed to demonstrate the ''determination'' of the Communist Party to wipe out corruption.
Mr Liu said the cases revealed the increasingly large amounts of money being embezzled by government officials.
The three officials executed included a former mayor, the head of a city public security bureau and the head of Shenzhen's housing authority, Chen Binggen who together with three accomplices was accused of embezzling three million yuan (HK$4.02 million).
While the three officials represented some of the ''biggest fish'' so far caught in the anti-corruption drag net, observers said a significant number of even more senior corrupt officials remained at large.
Chen, who was executed in Shenzhen, was found guilty of amassing a three million yuan fortune between 1989 and 1991 and of demanding a 60,000 yuan bribe from one company. Hong Yonglin, the director of Huizhou Public Security Bureau, was found guilty of accepting a total of $914,000 and 348,900 yuan in bribes for approving the registration of 100 smuggled cars and approving travel permits to Hong Kong.
