Chinese official sentenced to 12 yrs in jail for graft

A Chinese court today sentenced the former head of a provincial tourism bureau to 12 years jail term for taking millions in bribes.
The ruling was handed down by Anqing City Intermediate People's Court after it found Hu Xuefan, previously director of Anhui provincial bureau of tourism, guilty of having taken bribes totaling more than 4.6 million yuan (about USD 691,729).
The court found that Hu or his family members accepted cash, shopping cards and gold bars while he held positions at Mount Huangshan Resort, the Huangshan City Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Tourism Bureau of Anhui Province from 1999 to 2014, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Hu helped more than 20 companies or individuals with allocation of tourism funds, resort ratings, personnel promotion and other decisions in exchange for bribes.
The court hearing started on December 22 last year.
Hu confessed to the local procuratorate during the investigation but withdrew the confession later in court.

He was stripped of the illicit proceeds of 4.6 million yuan and was also fined 4 million yuan, the court said.
Hu said he would file an appeal after the ruling.
As a part of President Xi Jinping's massive crackdown on corruption, over 40 top Chinese Generals have faced anti-corruption probes.

Last month, a close aide of former Chinese president Hu Jintao was jailed for life for taking bribes, illegally obtaining state secrets and abuse of power, making him one of the senior officials of the previous regime to be punished in the anti-corruption campaign.
Thousands of officials, including several top CPC politicians and high ranking leaders, have been indicted in Xi's anti-graft campaign which has also drawn criticism that it enabled him to consolidate his hold on the power.