Former BOC chairman pleads guilty to graft

Liu Liange, former Party chief and chairman of Bank of China, pleaded guilty to accepting bribes totaling 121 million yuan ($16.7 million) and illegally issuing loans amounting to 3.32 billion yuan at a trial at Jinan Intermediate People's Court, in Shandong province, on Wednesday.

Liu confessed to his crimes and delivered a final statement in court. He will be sentenced later.

He served at Export-Import Bank of China from March 2007 until June 2018 and then began working at Bank of China. He became chairman of Bank of China in June 2019 and continued in that role until March 2023, when he was placed under investigation.

Prosecutors from the Jinan procuratorate said that from 2010 to 2023, Liu used his positions including vice-president and president of Export-Import Bank of China, as well as president, Party chief and chairman of Bank of China, to assist related units and individuals in matters of loan financing, project cooperation and personnel arrangements. In return, he demanded and accepted money and properties totaling more than 121 million yuan.

From the end of 2017 to the beginning of 2020, while working at Export-Import Bank of China and later Bank of China, Liu, knowing that related enterprises did not meet loan issuance conditions, violated the Law on Commercial Banks and the Banking Supervision Law among other legal stipulations by promoting the issuance of loans totaling more than 3.32 billion yuan, resulting in a principal loss of more than 190 million yuan.

Prosecutors asked that Liu be held criminally responsible for the crimes of accepting bribes and illegally issuing loans.

Liu, 62, a native of Jilin province, was expelled from the Party and arrested in October last year. He was indicted in February.

The finance sector has been a significant focus of China's anticorruption efforts in recent years. Since last year, dozens of officials at various levels from the banking, securities and fund sectors have been investigated. Several senior banking officials have been tried or sentenced recently.

On April 18, Fan Yifei, former vice-president of Bank of China, was charged with accepting bribes of 386 million yuan for using his positions to help others seek benefits.

In February, Tian Huiyu, former president of China Merchants Bank, was given the death penalty, suspended for two years, with deprivation of political rights for life and confiscation of all personal assets, for crimes including abuse of power by State-owned company personnel, accepting bribes of over 210 million yuan, and making nearly 300 million yuan through trading with undisclosed information, insider trading and disclosure of insider information.

yangzekun@chinadaily.com.cn