China Starts Probe Into Former Security Chief Zhou

Bloomberg News

China's ruling Communist Party announced its highest-level corruption probe since coming to power more than 60 years ago, saying it will investigate former Politburo Standing Committee member Zhou Yongkang.

Zhou is being probed on allegations of serious discipline violations, the official Xinhua News Agency reported, ending months of speculation about his fate in Chinese and foreign media following the arrest of many of his associates in business and government.

Today's move represents a tightening grip on power by China's President Xi Jinping, following his appointment as military chief and head of national security and economic-reform panels. It may also represent an effort to eliminate a center of power in China's factional political system, according to Dali Yang, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago.

'Zhou was a very influential figure who built up a powerful empire, and Xi wants to ensure that the power of the center should not be under threat,' Yang said by phone before the announcement. 'By cracking down on corruption and abuse of power, Xi plays to the base in the party.'

Investigating Zhou, the nation's former security chief, sends the signal that even the highest political elite aren't immune from a campaign to root out the corruption that Xi says threatens the party's hold on power. Party leaders have promised to target both 'tigers and flies' in the power hierarchy.

Bo Ally

Zhou, a member of the standing committee until November 2012, was an ally of Bo Xilaibefore the latter was ousted on corruption charges. Zhou, who oversaw the internal security forces whose budget under his watch surpassed that of the military, publicly voiced support for Bo's policies days before Bo was removed from his post in March 2012.

'The CCP resembles a major corporation,' said Kerry Brown, executive director of the University of Sydney's China Studies Center, before the probe into Zhou was announced. 'Even for the CCP in the 21st century, as the era of double digit growth ends, there are limits, and Zhou overstepped them.'

Zhou is the first standing committee member subject to an open criminal investigation since the Cultural Revolution, when former president Liu Shaoqi died in detention after being purged by Chairman Mao Zedong and denounced as a traitor. Former party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang, who broke with other top leaders in 1989 over their decision to suppress demonstrations in Beijing's Tiananmen Square with tanks and troops, was put under house arrest following his June 1989 ouster and never faced criminal charges.

Assets Seized

Since Xi came to power Chinese anti-corruption authorities have targeted people with connections to Zhou, detaining executives and firing senior officials.

That included a crackdown on corruption in the oil industry, where Zhou spent three decades and rose to lead state-owned China National Petroleum Corp. in the 1990s. Jiang Jiemin, previously CNPC's chairman, was removed as head of the commission overseeing state-owned companies after the government on Sept. 1 said he was under investigation. Zhou and Jiang worked together in 1989-90 in an oilfield in eastern China, according to their official biographies.

Jiang's Ouster

Days before Jiang was ousted, four other CNPC executives were removed. Other arrests happened in Sichuan, where Zhou served as Communist Party Secretary -- the southwestern Chinese province's top post -- from 1999 to 2002, according to his official biography. Wen Qingshan, the chairman of Kunlun Energy (135) Co., a gas distribution arm of CNPC, resigned Dec. 17 after China's Caixin magazine reported that he was in custody helping in a government graft probe. Wen's predecessor, Li Hualin, resigned amid the same investigation.

Zhou oversaw hundreds of thousands of police and paramilitary forces with an annual budget of more than $100 billion as the top official for the 'stability maintenance' program, ensuring the thousands of strikes, riots and other disturbances around China each year didn't become organized challenges to Communist rule.

Speculation that Zhou was in political jeopardy began in March 2012, before Xi took the top spot in the party. Zhou appeared with Bo at a March 8 meeting at Beijing's Great Hall of the People and praised Bo's achievements. A week later, Bo was removed from his post.

Zhou's Family

The investigation has ensnared Zhou's family with his son, Zhou Bin, seeking legal assistance to fight possible bribery and other charges, the South China Morning Post reported Jan. 10, citing unidentified sources.

Zhou was born in 1942 and is from Wuxi, a city in eastern Jiangsu province. He joined the party in 1964 on the eve of the Cultural Revolution while studying at the Beijing Petroleum Institute, now called the China University of Petroleum.

Zhou began his career in the energy industry when he went to work in 1967 as an apprentice and technician at the Daqing oilfield in the northeastern Heilongjiang province, taking successively higher posts in the industry until he served in the top job at CNPC from 1996 to 1998, according to his biography.

He later served as minister of land and resources and Sichuan party secretary before joining the Politburo in 2002 as minister of public security. He was one of nine men on the standing committee from 2007 until he stepped down as part of the leadership transition.

To contact Bloomberg News staff for this story: Henry Sanderson in Beijing at hsanderson@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrew Davis at abdavis@bloomberg.net Neil Western, Rosalind Mathieson