China sacks 200 army officers, 21 generals in massive crackdown

BEIJING: More than 200 senior military officers including 21 generals of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) have been sacked and demoted on charges of corruption and wasting resources, state media has reported.

Auditors for the PLA, the world’s largest armed forces, investigated 4,024 officers — from lieutenant colonel and above —since 2013. The number is higher than all cases of corruption and misconduct in the last three decades.

Among the 4,024 officers are 82 generals that have been the subject of scrutiny by PLA auditors since January 2013. Of these, 21 were removed from their posts, 144 were demoted and 77 reprimanded and asked to correct the problems that were discovered,” the PLA daily said in a report.

A military prosecutor said 90% of the criminal cases were related to infrastructure construction, property development, equipment purchasing as well as personnel and fund management.

The new revelations were made as President Xi Jinping continues with his high-profile anti-corruption campaign across the country within the Communist Party of China (CPC), the bureaucracy and the powerful armed forces.

Xi’s campaign, aimed at improving the CPC’s image among the people came under criticism from the rights group, Human Rights Watch, in its annual report released earlier this week.

The campaign “…has been conducted in ways that further undermine the rule of law, with accused officials held in an unlawful detention system, deprived of basic legal protections, and often coerced to confess,” the New Yorkbased group said in the report.

But the campaign is unlikely to lose steam.

“Last year, 15 high-ranking officers including Xu Caihou, former vice-chairman of the CMC, and Gu Junshan, former deputy head of the PLA GLD, were placed under investigation on suspicion of corruption,” the PLA report added.