With its anti-corruption drive going deeper and sweeping up an increasing number of high-ranking members, the Communist Party of China has convinced the nation as well as the outside world of its unswerving resolve to tighten discipline among its ranks and cultivate a clean government.

In a press conference yesterday, the Party's top discipline watchdog announced Chen Liangyu, former Shanghai Party chief, is now detained and waiting for trial. Chen was expelled from the CPC and scraped of all government posts earlier for corruption charges.

The magnitude of these severe punishments speak for themselves. The Party will never relent in its efforts to fight corruption, which could otherwise dampen public trust.

In fact, the Party leadership has been educating the whole Party of the importance sniffing out rats in its ranks and correcting wrongdoings. The recent falls of senior Party members are just part of the Party's intensified measures in combating the scourge of corruption.

A total of 1,790 Party members turned themselves in after the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), the Party's top discipline watchdog, urged officials who have traded power for money to confess within 30 days starting May 30.

Meanwhile, eye-catching progress has also been made to improve the intra-Party supervision system.

CCDI officials announced yesterday that an unprecedented inspection initiative has covered all 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities together with key State financial institutions.

Inspection tours made by independent Party discipline officials have proven to be helpful in diagnosing symptoms of corruption at an earlier stage.

Such inspection tours have become routine work of the CCDI and its organizations at provincial level. It will be expanded to grass-root levels, contributing to the building of an institutionalized intra-Party supervision system in fighting and preventing corruption.

Apart from tightened intra-Party supervision at the high level, supervision over the conduct of Party members from the public is also an indispensable link in building a non-escape net for corrupt officials.

In this regard, the channel for ordinary people to report the misconducts of Party members should be made smoother.

(China Daily 08/03/2007 page10)