The mayor of the major northern port city of Tianjin is being investigated on suspicion of corruption, China’s ruling Communist party said on Saturday, the latest senior official to be caught up in a war on deep-seated graft. Huang Xingguo, 61, was suspected of “serious discipline breaches”, the party’s central commission for discipline inspection said, using the party’s normal euphemism for corruption. Tianjin is an important port city about an hour’s drive from Beijing that has ambitions to become a financial hub for northern China. On Saturday, the official Tianjin Daily covered his visit to a middle school on its front page and praised teachers for their work. Critics have accused Xi of using the corruption campaign as a cover to root out political rivals, though he has denied this.

Source: The Guardian September 11, 2016 00:33 UTC