China's top anti-graft body to keep high pressure on corruption

BEIJING - China's top anti-graft authority has pledged to maintain a tough stance on corruption in 2017 and promote "comprehensively and strictly governing the Party" to go deeper.

Efforts are needed to maintain a sound intra-Party political environment and prepare for the 19th Communist Party of China (CPC) National Congress to be held this year, according to a communique released after the seventh plenary session of the 18th CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) held from Friday to Sunday.

The communique called for strengthened intra-Party supervision and strict procedures for official selection and promotion, so as to guarantee selection of clean officials for central and local governments.

Chinese President and General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee Xi Jinping spoke at the meeting, which was also attended by leaders including Li Keqiang, Zhang Dejiang, Yu Zhengsheng, Liu Yunshan, Wang Qishan and Zhang Gaoli.

"The spread of corruption has been effectively contained and the battle against corruption has gained crushing momentum," Xi said on Friday, calling for strict governance of the CPC systematically, creatively and effectively.

"The objective of ensuring officials do not dare to be corrupt has been basically achieved," Xi said, concluding that a new atmosphere is emerging in the political life within the Party.

According to the communique, China will establish a national supervisory commission and push the stipulation of a law on national supervision, as part of efforts to reform the state supervisory system.

China has begun to pilot supervisory system reform in Beijing Municipality and the provinces of Shanxi and Zhejiang.

The pilot work will see the establishment of local supervisory commissions at three levels - provincial, municipal and county - in order to form an integrated supervision system that will be "unified, authoritative and efficient," the communique said.

The new supervisory system will integrate the functions of current supervision authorities, corruption prevention agencies, as well as departments for handling bribery and dereliction of duty cases or the prevention of duty-related crimes under procuratorates at various levels, it said.

In 2017, efforts should be made to consolidate the crushing momentum on anti-corruption, said the communique, adding that corruption cases at grassroots level will also be dealt with seriously.

Typical cases will be exposed and some confessions of corrupt officials will be made public in order to warn others, it noted.

The communique called for internal system reform in disciplinary inspection departments and improving the mechanism of sending inspection teams.

It also vowed to ensure the selection of clean and capable leaders for discipline inspection commissions at all levels.