Ling Jihua, former aide to China's ex-president Hu Jintao, placed under graft probe
Party watchdog investigates United Front Work Department head for discipline violations, just days after an apparent pledge of loyalty to Xi
Ling Jihua, the one-time top aide to former president Hu Jintao , is being investigated by the nation's anti-graft watchdog.
The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said in a brief statement yesterday that 58-year-old Ling was under investigation for "suspected serious disciplinary violations", a term that usually refers to corruption. It gave no further details.
Ling is the latest top official to come under a corruption cloud since President Xi Jinping launched a massive anti-corruption campaign more than two years ago. That campaign has already led to the downfall of the nation's former security tsar Zhou Yongkang and Xu Caihou, the former vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission.
The announcement comes two years after Ling's political career was dealt a major blow with the controversy surrounding the death of his son Ling Gu in a Ferrari crash in March 2012.
Ling was the chief of the General Office of the Communist Party's Central Committee and Hu's personal secretary before 2011 - a post that is thought to have put him at the centre of the country's highest reaches of political decision making.
He was also thought to be a political rising star, with the chance of elevation to the supreme Politburo Standing Committee in a party leadership reshuffle in November 2012.