Chinese official sentenced to death over US$325m corruption

A Chinese official has been sentenced to death after accepting 2.2 billion yuan (US$325 million) in bribes over three decades, making it one of the country’s biggest corruption cases in recent years. Yang Youlin, 69, a former senior official in the eastern city of Nanjing, was convicted of bribery, embezzlement, abuse of power and money laundering. Prosecutors said he used his positions between 1993 and 2023 to help secure engineering contracts, land transfers and financing in exchange for cash and valuables. The court ruled that Yang’s crimes were “of an extremely serious nature” and caused “exceptionally heavy losses to the interests of the state and the people”. Although Yang pleaded guilty, expressed remorse and cooperated with investigators, the court said the gravity of his offences meant he did not deserve a lighter sentence. The case is among China’s biggest corruption scandals in recent years and forms part of President Xi Jinping’s sweeping anti-corruption campaign, which has targeted senior government officials, military officers and banking executives.