Former Senior Official on Trial for Embezzlement and BriberyA local court in east China's Anhui Province has recently begun a trial of 67-year-old Zhou Yude, chairman of the board of a state-owned enterprise.He has been found guilty of embezzling more than 5.5 million HK dollars of public funds and taking 500,000 HK dollars of bribes from 1993 to 1996. Zhou, native of Yichang of the neighboring Hubei province, once served as the mayor of Ma'anshan city in Anhui for 13 years until 1993, the year he got the position as chairman of the board of the Hong Kong Huangshan Company, a large state-controlled enterprise. In April 1999, Zhou was arrested for his involvement in economic crimes. One year later, he was released on bail awaiting a court hearing. Zhou is adamant that he is not guilty of charges brought against him. The court will announce Zhou's pending sentence soon. |
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