Senior Beijing official sentenced to life on corruption charges

BEIJING, May 8 (Xinhua) -- A former senior Beijing
city government official was jailed for life Friday for accepting five
apartments from development companies in return for helping the planning and
building processes.

Xu Shuying, 68, had been using his position as deputy
head of Haidian District government from 1995 to 2003 to seek illegal gains, the
First Intermediate People's Court of Beijing found.

Xu was in charge of urban construction when he
accepted two apartments worth 2.23 million yuan (327,000 U.S. dollars) from the
legal representative of a property company called Taiyue and two more from other
companies.

He also demanded an apartment as a bribe from another
company. The total value of the five homes exceeded 6.29 million yuan (922,300
U.S. dollars), the court heard.

Disciplinary authorities began investigating Xu in
March last year after being tipped off that he had accepted an apartment from
Taiyue. Xu then confessed to accepting the other four apartments, the court
heard.

Xu was told he was being treated with leniency
because he confessed to the crimes and all illegal gains had been seized.

Xu had no plan to appeal against the first-instance
ruling, said a court official.