Guo Boxiong (left) speaks to rescue workers and paramilitary officials during a visit to a quake-hit area in Sichuan province in 2008. Photo: AFP
Former top military leader Guo Boxiong has confessed to bribe-taking, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Tuesday, citing military prosecutors.
Guo was for a decade one of the two vice chairmen of the Central Military Commission, second only to the president in the top body of the People's Liberation Army (PLA). He retired in 2012 and was expelled from the ruling Communist Party last year.
His fall came as President Xi Jinping seeks to consolidate his power and enhance his control over the PLA, the world's largest military and technically the armed force of the ruling party, rather than the state.
Guo was found to have taken advantage of his position "to assist the promotion and relocation of other people, accepting an extremely huge amount of bribe personally and through his family", Xinhua cited military prosecutors as saying in a statement.
The 73-year-old had been formally charged and the procedure to prosecute him had begun, it added.
In the mainland, criminal charges normally follow expulsion from the ruling party, with trial, conviction and a jail term effectively guaranteed to follow in a court system controlled by the Communist Party.
http://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1252690-20160405.htm
