China sentences ex-Nanjing official to death over $325m bribery

A court in eastern China has sentenced a former senior official from Nanjing to death after finding him guilty of accepting more than 2.2 billion yuan ($325 million) in bribes over a three-decade period.

According to a BBC report, Yang Youlin, 69, was also convicted of embezzlement, abuse of power and money laundering. Authorities said the case involved one of the largest amounts of illicit gains uncovered in recent years.

State media said Yang abused a series of public positions he held in Nanjing between 1993 and 2023 to help individuals obtain engineering contracts, land transfers and financing in exchange for money and valuable gifts.

The verdict was delivered by a court in Changzhou yesterday (6 July), which said Yang's crimes were "of an extremely serious nature" and "caused exceptionally heavy losses to the interests of the state and the people".

Yang came under investigation as part of Chinese President Xi Jinping's long-running anti-corruption campaign, which has targeted senior officials across sectors including the military and financial institutions.

Since taking office, Xi has launched multiple anti-graft campaigns that have led to the prosecution of thousands of officials. Critics, however, argue that the drive has also been used to remove political opponents.

Although China imposes severe penalties for corruption, death sentences for financial crimes remain relatively uncommon and are generally reserved for cases involving exceptionally large sums, often exceeding one billion yuan.

In 2021, former financial executive Lai Xiaomin was executed after being convicted of accepting 1.8 billion yuan in bribes over a decade. More recently, former Inner Mongolia official Li Jianping was executed in 2024 after being found guilty of embezzlement and bribery involving more than three billion yuan.

Many other corruption cases have resulted in lengthy prison terms or suspended death sentences, which are typically commuted to life imprisonment after a specified period. Courts have also reduced punishments for some offenders who cooperated with investigators by providing information on other suspects.

However, the Changzhou court said Yang's cooperation did not merit a lighter sentence, ruling that although he had assisted investigators, his crimes were so "grave" that his assistance "was insufficient to warrant a more lenient punishment".

State media reported that Yang pleaded guilty during the proceedings and "expressed remorse in his final statement".