China's justice minister leaves post

December 2, 2000
Web posted at: 8:19 AM HKT (0019 GMT)

BEIJING, China (Reuters) -- Chinese Justice Minister Gao Changli left his post abruptly last week for what the ministry said on Friday were health reasons, but a Hong Kong and a Western newspaper said he had been fired and was under investigation.

A Justice Ministry spokesman who confirmed Gao's departure said he was unaware of a Wall Street Journal report which quoted ministry sources as saying Gao had been detained and was under questioning at a hotel outside Beijing for "irregularities."

"Mr Gao has not been minister since last week. I don't know where he is now," the spokesman said. "I think his departure was due to health problems."

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Gao, 63, whose job was overseeing pivotal reforms of China's underdeveloped and corruption-ridden legal system, had not yet been replaced, the spokesman said.

Several Justice Ministry officials said they were unaware of any change at the top.

The electronic edition of the Wall Street Journal said Gao cleaned out his desk on November 26 and was succeeded by Zhang Fusen, a former vice justice minister.

There has been no mention in China's state media of his departure, which was reported in a Hong Kong newspaper on Thursday.

The newspaper said Gao was under detention at the Jiuhua Shanzhuang hotel on the outskirts of Beijing, where he was being held for round-the-clock questioning. He had not been formally charged with any wrongdoing, it said.

A spokesman at Jiuhua Shanzhuang told Reuters Gao was not in the hotel on Friday morning, but declined to clarify whether Gao had been there recently.

Gao, who spent five years as vice president of the Supreme People's Court, was identified with a drive to make China's legal system more transparent and clean up court corruption, as demanded by ordinary Chinese and foreign investors alike.

Diplomats said Gao was one of many reform-minded technocrats Premier Zhu Rongji brought with him to power in March, 1998.

"However, he was thought to be not forceful enough in pushing through reforms at the ministry," said one foreign diplomat.

The limits of legal reform were evident in the apparent lack of due process in the minister's own case, said Sophia Woodman, research director of the New York-based Human Rights in China.

"I find it shocking that the Minister of Justice himself is subject to an extrajudicial and arbitrary form of detention, when it's not clear that he's been charged with any crime," she said.

Efforts had been made to open up China's judicial system during Gao's tenure, including encouraging people to attend court hearings, televising trials and opening case files to the public.

Last week, in response to charges of rampant nepotism in the judiciary, China's top courts announced bans on judges' families from running law firms in the same jurisdiction or conducting business transactions with the court.

Gao is the second minister to leave the Zhu cabinet under a cloud. Water Resources Minister Niu Maosheng was transferred to a provincial governorship in late 1998 after auditors found massive misappropriation of flood control funds at the ministry.

China is directing a much-publicized campaign against graft at ever more senior levels of Communist officialdom, although ordinary people believe top rungs of power remain untouchable.

Several senior officials have been executed for corruption this year amid repeated warnings by top leaders that graft threatens the Communist Party's grip on power.

Chinese courts sentenced 14 people to death last month, including senior police and customs officials, in the first verdicts of a multi-billion dollar smuggling case centered on the southern port of Xiamen.

More death sentences are expected in the case -- the biggest corruption scandal since the Communist Party came to power in 1949 -- which has implicated close to 200 people, including national officials and the top hierarchy of the party.

The website of the official China Daily newspaper said on Friday that Xiamen Vice Mayor Su Shuili had been sacked to clear the way for his trial in the case. It gave no details.

Sources familiar with Gao suggest his troubles may ultimately be traced to events or connections back in Shandong, the northern province where he served in high party posts before his promotion to senior jobs in Beijing.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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