Shanghai (AsiaNews) – Another member of the Chinese Communist Party has been detained by the police for interrogation in relation to the corruption scandal that has rocked Shanghai, China's economic capital. Ling Baoheng, head of Shanghai's State Assets Supervision and Administration Commission, was taken from his home last Sunday and is now in police custody. He is the latest of more than 50 officials and business executives taken in for questioning over a massive corruption case involving misuse of the city's 10 billion yuan pension fund.
The case has already claimed Shanghai's top party leader, party Secretary Chen Liangyu. Other party officials have been barred from travelling overseas
Ling has served in his current post since April 2004. Previously, he was vice-chairman of the Shanghai Light Industry Group and a vice-chairman of the Shanghai Economic Commission.
He advised on the restructuring of several Shanghai state-owned companies, including telecommunications equipment maker Shanghai Electric Group, which has been implicated in the scandal. One of its directors, Zhang Rongkun, has been formally arrested.
Besides the former party secretary, other local officials implicated include labour chief Zhu Junyi, Baoshan district head Qin Yu and Sun Luyi, a deputy secretary-general of Shanghai's Municipal Party Committee.
The man who brought Formula One racing to China, Yu Zhifei, and the nation's top statistician, Qiu Xiaohua, have also been caught up in the scandal.
The scandal is widely seen as an attempt by President Hu Jintao to break the back of the Shanghai gang, a circle made up of local party leaders and business executives under the wing of former President Jiang Zemin.
Speaking at the opening ceremony on Sunday of a meeting of the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities, Mr Hu said that the government "is fully committed to fighting corruption and is working vigorously to prevent [it] from happening".
Between January 2003 and August this year, the authorities punished 67,505 officials, according to the Supreme People's Procuratorate, mostly for crimes related to corruption.
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