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China Readies First Verdicts in Massive Smuggling Scandal
Verdicts for officials implicated in China's biggest corruption scandal are expected this week, a court official said Monday.
Defendants in the multibillion-dollar smuggling case are being tried under intense secrecy in five cities in the southern coastal province of Fujian.
The Intermediate People's Court in Zhangzhou, one of the cities, will start issuing its first verdicts this week, said a court management official contacted by telephone. She had no details about defendants or the charges against them, and would not give her name.
The China Daily newspaper said in September that judges were expected to hand out a number of death sentences in the case. Already this year, Chinese authorities pursuing a nationwide anti-graft drive have executed a deputy provincial governor and a former deputy chairman of the national legislature.
The smuggling case centers on the bustling southern port of Xiamen and the Yuanhua Group, a Xiamen-based company accused of smuggling cars, cigarettes, oil and other goods reportedly worth up to US$ 10 billion. [source: chinadaily.com.cn]
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