Princeling commissar Liu Yuan forfeits key role over rumoured links to Bo
General loses seat on presidium after failing to secure promotion in PLA political department
General Liu Yuan , the political commissar of the People's Liberation Army's General Logistics Department, has failed to retain his membership of the presidium of the Communist Party's national congress, sparking speculation about his early retirement amid rumours of his connection to disgraced former Chongqing party secretary Bo Xilai .
Liu, 61, was left off a list of nearly 250 members of the congress presidium released yesterday, Xinhua reported.
Professor Joseph Cheng Yu-shek, a political scientist at Hong Kong's City University, said Liu's political career "may have been adversely affected by rumours about him and Bo Xilai".
A source close to Bo's family said Liu was a classmate of Bo Xilai's younger brother Bo Xicheng , adding: "He [Liu] might have been deeply implicated by Bo's downfall."
Both Liu and Bo Xicheng were born in 1951 and were students of Beijing's prestigious No4 Middle School, the alma mater of scores of descendants of the party's revolutionary veterans. Liu is the son of former president Liu Shaoqi . Bo Xilai and Bo Xicheng are the sons of former vice-premier Bo Yibo .
But General Zhang Haiyang , the 63-year-old political commissar of the PLA's strategic missile force who was also rumoured to have links to Bo Xilai, had his presidium membership renewed yesterday.