Billionaire Liu Han, one of the richest men in China, was sentenced to death last week. It turned out that Liu had some rather unique ways of making his fortune. On the one side, Liu was the head of the Sichuan Hanlong Group, a massive conglomerate dealing in solar energy, mining, communications, and chemicals, to name a few.
But on the other side, Liu was involved in some pretty nasty things. In February, Liu, his brother, and 34 other of his associates were arrested for running a “Mafia-style” gang. He was charged with 21 different crimes, including murder, fraud, extortion, gunrunning, and illegal detention.
Doesn’t that fill you with confidence about doing business in China?
In addition to Liu, his brother, and three others were sentenced to death, five others received a death sentence with a two-year reprieve (which typically get commuted to life in prison), four got life in prison, and the other 22 are going to jail for various terms.
Liu Han was just one of the many “tigers and flies” that Chinese leader Xi Jinping vowed to root out in a massive anti-corruption campaign that has swept China. Right before Xi took charge of the Chinese Communist Party, former CCP leader Hu Jintao warned that corruption “could destroy the Communist Party.” The anti-corruption campaign has become the cornerstone of Xi’s tenure and Liu Han has just become the latest head on Xi’s mantle place.
Well, at least that’s the story they want you to believe. The reality is actually much different. And much worse.
That Liu Han was breaking the law wasn’t news. According to Chinese state-run Xinhua, his crimes date back to 1993. So for two decades, Liu’s reign of terror was left unchecked. And the reason he was given free reign was because of connections he had with China’s ruling elite, specifically Zhou Yongkang.
Zhou used to be the Party secretary of Sichuan during 2001–2002 before moving up to the top of the Communist Party leadership as a member of the then nine-member Politburo Standing Committee. Zhou was in charge of the entire internal security apparatus of China, including the police. And Liu Han was never investigated.
But then Xi Jinping, Zhou’s political rival, assumed power in 2012. It’s widely believed that Zhou was involved in two failed assassination attempts and a failed coup against Xi Jinping. So now that Xi’s in power, he’s been dismantling the powerbase Zhou built up and is gunning for the man himself.
The only problem is, there’s been an unwritten rule within the Communist Party that top leaders were off limits since the end of the Cultural Revolution. Going after Zhou could shake the very foundation of the Party.
So Xi Jinping has been drawing a net around the now-retired Zhou by taking out his allies. In the past few months, 300 of Zhou’s friends, family, and associates have been investigated and $14.5 billion in assets have been seized. That’s on top of other allies—in politics (like Bo Xilai) and in the oil industry where Zhou made his fortune—who have already been sentenced. Liu Han was just one of them. And he’s been sentenced to death. If I were 1 of the 300 others, I’d be worried.
Liu Han’s “Mafia-style” gang is finished, but it wasn’t because of his crimes that he was stopped. Only because he was on the losing side of a battle for power within the Chinese Communist Party did Liu meet his fate.
How many others like Liu are still out there, free to break the law under the protection of their political patrons?
For more China Uncensored, please visit youtube.com/ntdchinauncensored.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
