Anti-graft momentum 'consolidated'

Plenary Session statement says inspectors fulfilled their duties

China has gained and consolidated "crushing momentum" in its fight against corruption, according to a statement released on Saturday following a key Communist Party of China conference.

The Seventh Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, held from Wednesday to Saturday in Beijing, is the Party's most important conference before its upcoming 19th National Congress, which will open on Wednesday.

The statement said the "crushing momentum" of the fight against corruption, noted late last year at a Political Bureau meeting, has now been "consolidated".

During the session, the senior officials discussed and approved a work report of the CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the country's top anti-graft watchdog. The work report will be delivered to the congress.

Participants at the session reviewed the work of the 18th CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection over the past five years and agreed that discipline inspection commissions at all levels have fulfilled the duties endowed by the Party Constitution and have comprehensively pushed forward the strict governance of the Party.

The discipline inspection commissions have been working hard to build a clean Party and root out corruption, firmly upholding the eight-point frugality code put forward by the CPC Central Committee in late 2012.

The statement also said that the commissions have made full use of their inspections, prioritizing discipline, and have advanced the reform of discipline inspection and the country's supervisory system.

Moreover, the commissions have built groups of staff in discipline inspection and supervision that both the Party and the people can trust, while consistently improving the accountability system, uncompromisingly containing the spread of corruption and purifying the political ecology within the CPC, the statement said.

The plenum endorsed a decision made by the Political Bureau to expel Sun Zhengcai, a former member of the Political Bureau and former Chongqing Party secretary, and eleven other senior officials from the CPC.

Since members of the 18th CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection were elected in late 2012, the top anti-graft watchdog has undertaken a massive campaign against corruption and extravagance.

Li Chengyan, head of Peking University's Center for Anti-Corruption Studies, said the Party's upcoming 19th National Congress will have great significance for the country's anti-corruption work.

"The 19th National Congress will summarize the work of the CCDI in the past five years, and some of the current thought on anti-corruption, like 'fighting both tigers (senior corrupt officials) and flies (lower-level corrupt officials)', will be highlighted," he said.