The ruling was handed down by the Intermediate People's Court in Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province recently.

In accordance with the court ruling, Cui, who was chairman of the board and general manager of the Shenzhen Import and Export Co.Ltd. of the China Foreign Trade Development Corporation under the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation (MOFTEC), was also deprived of his political rights for life.

All personal assets of both Cui and Feng, who was deputy general manager of the company, are to be confiscated.

The court verdict said Cui, in collaboration with his wife, TaoGehong, embezzled 8.96 million yuan (about 1.08 million US dollars)by channeling public funds into his own bourse account from January 1995 through to August 1998.

In late 1996, Cui also collaborated with deputy general managerFeng Boya, who was in charge of corporate financial affairs, and embezzled 5.28 million yuan (about 635,542 US dollars) of public funds, 600,000 yuan (about 72,289.2 US dollars) of which Feng usedto purchase an open-market apartment for himself.

In what appeared to be an effort to save the debt-ridden China Foreign Trade Development Corporation, which is headquartered in Shenzhen, Cui applied to change the Shenzhen import and export development company, into a joint-stock entity in 1998. The application was approved in principle by MOFTEC in June that year.

The new trading company, formerly the building materials importand export department, the most lucrative arm of China Foreign Trade Development Corporation, listed four shareholders, but in fact, 72 percent of the new company's stake was paid by a private firm which was registered by a businessman Liu Li but controlled by Cui and Feng.

Tao Gehong and Liu Li, both of whom have escaped, are alleged to have directly or indirectly embezzled public funds and the search for them is continuing.

( July 20, 2002)