China sentences former defence ministers to death with reprieve

By Antoni Slodkowski

BEIJING, May 7 (Reuters) – Former Chinese defence ministers Wei Fenghe and Li Shangfu were both sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve over graft charges, state news agency Xinhua reported on Thursday, underscoring the severity of the purge in the military.

The armed forces have been one of the main targets of a broad corruption crackdown ordered by President Xi Jinping after coming to power in 2012. The purges reached the elite Rocket Force, which oversees nuclear weapons as well as conventional missiles, in 2023.

Earlier this year they escalated further, resulting in the removal of the top general in the People’s Liberation Army, Zhang Youxia, who was a Politburo member and was long seen as an ally of Xi.

Past reports in Xinhua said Li had been suspected of receiving “huge sums of money” in bribes as well as bribing others, and an investigation found he “did not fulfil political responsibilities” and “sought personnel benefits for himself and others”.

An investigation launched into Wei in 2023 found that he had accepted “a huge amount of money and valuables” in bribes and “helped others gain improper benefits in personnel arrangements”, Xinhua reported in 2024, adding that his actions were “extremely serious in nature, with a highly detrimental impact and tremendous harm”.

A death sentence with reprieve in China is typically commuted to life imprisonment if the offender commits no crimes during the period of reprieve.

After the commutation, they will be imprisoned for life without the possibility of further commutation or parole, Xinhua said.

China’s ongoing military corruption purges are leaving serious deficiencies in its command structure and are likely to have hampered the readiness of its rapidly modernising armed forces, the International Institute for Strategic Studies said this year.

(Reporting by Antoni Slodkowski and Beijing Newsroom;Editing by Peter Graff and Alison Williams)