Former ICBC senior official sentenced, fined for bribery

Liu Lixian, former senior official of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, was sentenced to eight years in prison for bribery, along with a fine of 2 million yuan ($274,020), a court in Shandong province announced on Tuesday.

Liu's illicit gains and related interests have also been confiscated and will be turned over to the national treasury, according to the ruling made by the Intermediate People's Court in Dezhou.

After an investigation, the court found that Liu, from 1998 to 2022, took advantage of his various positions to seek profits for relevant individuals and departments in matters such as business operation, case handling and recruitment, of which he accepted bribes worth more than 17.76 million yuan in return.

In August 2022, Liu, former member of the Communist Party of China committee of ICBC and former head of its discipline inspection commission, surrendered to the country's anti-corruption authorities, the court said.

"Liu's behavior has constituted the crime of bribery and should be harshly punished, as the amount of bribes he accepted was extremely huge," it said. "Considering that he surrendered to the investigators, confessed to the crime and voluntarily handed over his illicit gains, we've leniently penalized him."

Public information shows that Liu, 70, was placed under disciplinary and supervisory investigation in September 2023. At the beginning of this year, he was expelled from the Party. In May, he was indicted on the charge of bribery.

In September, the Dezhou court publicly heard his case.