Recently, a Hong Kong magazine published an exposé on the crimes and sexual transgressions of the Chinese regime’s former security czar Zhou Yongkang. This article follows up on an earlier report by the magazine on the large number of Zhou’s associates who have been arrested and the stupendous wealth Zhou has acquired.
Chengming Magazine is believed to be on good terms with the Xi Jinping administration, and has regularly produced scoops that rely on unnamed sources in Beijing. In its most recent edition, Chengming reports that it obtained a document in which authorities in Beijing discuss the crimes committed by Zhou Yongkang.
Zhou was for a long time one of the most powerful men in the Chinese regime and succeeded in turning the security forces he headed into a “second power center,” rivaling the general secretary’s authority, according to China Epoch Times commentator Wang Hua.
Zhou was formally arrested on Aug. 1, 2014, the biggest of the “big tigers” brought down by the current anti-corruption campaign.
According to the memo obtained by Chengming, Zhou’s crimes include violations of “political discipline, organizational discipline, and confidential discipline,” with the numbers of each violation enumerated. Zhou is said to have violated “confidential discipline” nine times, for instance.
The crime of “disclosure of Party and state secrets” includes seven instances in which secrets were leaked to foreign institutions.
The internal memo also mentions how Zhou was involved in crimes of “committing adultery with multiple females as part of an exchange for political power and money.”
The document goes deep into Zhou’s career to uncover his sexual crimes, reporting on multiple extramarital affairs and “indecent relationships” in 1985, when Zhou was mayor and municipal deputy party secretary of Panjin City in northeastern Liaoning Province.
In 1998, Zhou is reported to have fooled around with 27 named women whom he rewarded for their sexual favors with posts they were not qualified for, during trips to cities around China, including Shenyang, Dalian, Wuhan, Nanjing, Chengdu, Changsha, and Tianjin.
The magazine also reported that Zhou has been suffering from a sexually transmitted disease since March 2005.
US$16 Billion Confiscated
In a previous edition Chengming magazine reported on an internal memo of a special task force assigned to investigate Zhou and his relatives and associates in the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (the umbrella organization with authority over all parts of the security apparatus and justice system in China that became very powerful under Zhou), the petroleum industry (which he had run), and Sichuan Province (where Zhou had an early political power base).
According to the memo, a total of 313 of Zhou’s relatives and associates had been arrested, including 11 with a position of vice minster, 56 heading departments, 14 who were relatives of Zhou, and 28 people were either those working for or were guards for Zhou.
11 people had gone missing including Zhou’s sister in law Gu Xiaoxia, his personal secretary named Liang, and a mistress named Lin, who had previously been part of the Shenyang Military Region art troupe. The memo reported that relatives and associates of Zhou are currently been tracked down internationally.
The report also stated that the procuratorate (the institution in China’s legal system responsible for investigating and prosecuting crime) in the jurisdictions of Beijing, Liaoning, Jiangsu Province, Shandong Province, Shanghai, and Guangdong each separately issued search warrants for Zhou’s residences in 7 different provinces.
326 residences in Beijing, Shenyang, Dalian, Jinan, Yantai, Chengdu, Nanjing, Wuxi, Suzhou, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen with a combined worth of up to 1.76 billion yuan (about $282.55 million).
42,850 grams of gold, silver, and gold coins.
Cash: 152.7 million yuan ($24.5 million), $275 million, 662 thousand euro, 10,000 British pounds, and 55,000 Swiss francs.
62 cars including military jeeps and a medium-sized tourist bus.
55 paintings including those by famous painters and some oil painters, with a total market value of up to 8 million to 1 billion yuan ($128.4 million to $160.5 million)
5 each of 3 different types of domestically manufactured guns, 3 each of guns from Germany, Russia, England and Belgium, and up to 11,000 bullets.
In addition, 647 accounts and 117 foreign currency accounts belonging to Zhou and his relatives in 12 financial institutions and 133 different branches were frozen. 930 other accounts under pseudonyms, fake names, and company names had 37.7336 billion yuan ($6.06 billion).
Petroleum, aviation, wine, and financial securities with a total market value of 51.3 billion yuan ($8.24 billion), as well as foreign securities and bonds worth up to 170 million yuan ($27.29 million) were seized.
Based on the list, the assets confiscated from Zhou totaled over 100 billion yuan in value ($16.05 billion).
Original by Tang Di/NTD Television
