China vows to punish any wrongdoing in poverty relief

BEIJING - China will continue to take strong hands on any wrongdoing in poverty alleviation, such as raking in money and violating the law and discipline in the cloak of poverty relief, a senior official in charge of poverty alleviation said Thursday.

"We must keep up the deterrence against such acts, and crack down on those who try to contaminate the image of poverty alleviation," said Liu Yongfu, director of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, at a press briefing at the media center of the second session of the 13th National People's Congress.

In recent years, the country has handled a number of cases of misconduct in the area including favoritism for relatives and friends, frauds, the practice of formalities for formalities' sake and bureaucratism, according to Liu.

He called for further recording and tracking of impoverished households on issues such as the causes to poverty, the effect of poverty relief measures, and how they did after getting rid of poverty, so as to prevent wrongdoing.

Liu also stressed transparency, fairness and justice in poverty relief projects, saying that details of the funding of projects at village and township levels must be made public.