Former bank chief gets suspended death sentence

Former Bank of China chairman Liu Liange received a death sentence with a two-year reprieve for accepting over 121 million yuan ($16.7 million) in bribes, a court in Jinan, Shandong province, announced on Tuesday.

He was also sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined 150,000 yuan for illegally issuing 3.32 billion yuan in loans, the Jinan Intermediate People's Court said.

The court ruled he would serve the sentences concurrently, with the death sentence being suspended after a two-year reprieve. If he behaves well during the reprieve, his sentence will be commuted to life in prison. The life sentence could be further reduced with good behavior.

All of Liu's personal assets will be confiscated, and he has been deprived of his political rights for life. His illicit gains and relevant interests have been turned over to the national treasury, the court said.

The court found that between 2010 and 2023, Liu took advantage of his positions in the country's bank system, including as president of Export-Import Bank of China and chairman of Bank of China, to seek profits for certain individuals and departments in various matters such as loan financing, project cooperation and personnel arrangement, after accepting bribes worth more than 121 million yuan.

In addition, Liu knowingly violated the law by issuing loans totaling more than 3.32 billion yuan from 2017 to 2020 to enterprises that did not meet loan issuance conditions, resulting in a principal loss of over 190 million yuan, the ruling added.

"Liu's behaviors constitute the crimes of bribery and illegally issuing loans. He should be sentenced to death, as both the amounts of the bribes he accepted and the illegal loans he issued were exceptionally huge, showing extremely severe criminal circumstances and particularly causing a negative impact on society, bringing huge losses to the interests of the state and people," the court said.

"Considering he pleaded guilty to the offenses, voluntarily confessed to bribery instances not yet known to the investigators and returned all illicit gains, and because some of his bribes were not successful, we've leniently punished him with a two-year reprieve."

Public information showed that Liu, 63, a native of Jilin province, had worked in China's bank system for decades. He resigned from the Bank of China on March 19 last year.

He was placed under disciplinary and supervisory investigation in March last year, and expelled from the Communist Party of China about six months later.

In February this year, he was indicted on the charges of bribery and illegally issuing loans. The case was publicly heard by the court in April.