Chinese anti-corruption blitz snares another senior official

The detention of Guangxi vice-chairman Liu Hongwu comes ahead of the annual meeting of the country’s top anti-corruption agency

This week also saw a former senior security official being charged with bribery and a city’s former Communist Party boss admitting to corruption

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Liu Hongwu, vice-chairman of the southern region of Guangxi, has been detained on suspicion of corruption. Photo: Handout

Published: 8:10pm, 14 Jan 2022Updated: 8:34pm, 14 Jan 2022

A senior Chinese provincial official is facing a corruption investigation – becoming the latest in a series of detentions and charges announced against high-ranking officials this year.

The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), the Communist Party’s top disciplinary watchdog, said on Friday that Liu Hongwu, 56, vice-chairman of the southern region of Guangxi, had been detained on suspicion of “serious violations of discipline and the law” – an euphemism for corruption.

The first indication of his downfall happened on Wednesday when his name disappeared from the government’s official website, according to a Guangxi official.

Liu spent his entire career in Guangxi, serving in various leading positions in the Guangxi Development and Reform Commission and being made the region’s vice-chairman in July 2020.

News of his detention came ahead of the CCDI’s annual work conference, which is usually held in the last w eek of January – a time when the detention and trial of senior officials is often announced.

On Thursday, prosecutors in the northeastern city of Changchun officially charged Sun Lijun, a former public security vice-minister, with accepting a “huge amount” of bribes, market manipulation and the illegal possession of firearms, signalling that his trial would likely begin soon.