The Bo Xilai Affair

[Count Bobulescu]

China took another step Monday toward concluding its political crisis and setting the date for a once-a-decade leadership change, when a court handed a 15-year jail sentence to the former police chief of Chongqing city who triggered this year’s turmoil in the Communist Party elite.

Wang Lijun, who fled to a U.S. consulate in the southwestern city of Chengdu in February, was found guilty of defection, bribery, abuse of power and “bending the law for selfish ends” following his two-day trial last week at the Intermediate People’s Court in Chengdu, the state-run Xinhua news agency said.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...malertAsianews

[Yojimbo]

I'm still curious to know what Wang Lijun said to the Americans during his few hours holed up in the Consulate. The US isn't saying. I wonder if the fairly light sentence is part of some sort of deal.

[Count Bobulescu]

China Forensic Expert Defiant After Casting Doubt on Gu Kailai Story
A top Chinese forensics expert who challenged the official story behind the murder of Briton Neil Heywood in a blog post on Wednesday published another defiant blog post on Friday that has won near universal praise online.

http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/2...-kailai-story/

Former Chongqing Party Secretary Bo Xilai has been expelled from the Chinese Communist Party and will "face justice," the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Meanwhile, the 18th Party Congress, which will select the next generation of Chinese leaders, will be convened on Nov. 8, Xinhua said.

Mr. Bo was dismissed from his position as Chongqing party chief for unspecified infractions of party discipline. A Chinese court last month convicted his wife, Gu Kailai, for the murder of a British businessman.

http://stream.wsj.com/story/bo-xilai...=djemalertNEWS

BEIJING — China’s ruling Communist Party has expelled the once-powerful political leader Bo Xilai and accused him of corruption and moral crimes, officials said Friday, ending months of rampant rumors and signs of debate within the country’s leadership over his fate.
Party officials also have scheduled China’s once-a-decade transition of top leaders for Nov. 8, the state-controlled Xinhua news agency reported.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...y.html?hpid=z1

[Count Bobulescu]

Did Bo Xilai's wife (or someone else) murder an MI6 informant? The Wall Street Journal reports that Neil Heywood, the British consultant who died a year ago in mysterious circumstances in Chongqing, was passing information to Britain's secret service. Gu Kailai, the wife of disgraced former Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai, was convicted of Heywood's murder in a dubious trial. Back in March, the Journal reported that Heywood was working for a British private intelligence firm, Hakluyt. Other reports suggested he was a so-called "white glove", who helped rich Chinese politicians and their families move money out of China.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...894694144.html

[C. Flower]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...894694144.html

Hakluyt more or less = M16.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakluyt_%26_Company

[Yojimbo]

Hakluyt more or less = M16.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakluyt_%26_Company

It all sounds a bit like Our Man in Havana. Graham Greene would be writing it up no doubt if he was still alive.

Heywoods type would always be on hand to give a bit of info to 'the right type of chap' in foreign parts, all in aid of justifying someones intelligence budget. I doubt it would mean much in reality. But having said that I always found it quite curious how quiet the British government has been about the murder of one of its citizens.

[C. Flower]

It all sounds a bit like Our Man in Havana. Graham Greene would be writing it up no doubt if he was still alive.

Heywoods type would always be on hand to give a bit of info to 'the right type of chap' in foreign parts, all in aid of justifying someones intelligence budget. I doubt it would mean much in reality. But having said that I always found it quite curious how quiet the British government has been about the murder of one of its citizens.

I remember being forcibly struck by the resemblance to Greene's hoover "blueprints" of the WMD "evidence" produced by Colin Powell, as a precursor to the war on Iraq.