China’s ruling Communist Party expelled two former defence ministers on corruption charges, ending speculation over their fate after a spate of purges rocked the nation’s defence universe.
The 24-man Politburo made the decision to oust Li Shangfu and his predecessor Wei Fenghe at a meeting on Thursday, according to state television. Both men took bribes, failed to cooperate with investigations and set a bad example, according to the report.
Wei, who “accepted huge sums of money,” served as defence minister from 2018 to 2023 before being replaced by Li, who was abruptly fired in October after just seven months in the job — becoming the nation’s shortest-serving defence minister.
“Li Shangfu, as a senior leading cadre of the party and the army, abandoned his original mission and party principles,” China Central Television said. His behaviour “seriously contaminated the political ecology of the army’s equipment field and the moral fibre of the industry,” it added.
President Xi Jinping’s government has unseated at least 16 senior military figures since opening a corruption investigation into hardware purchases going back to 2017 last summer. Several of those officials, including Wei, have ties to the secretive Rocket Force that the top Chinese leader revamped in 2015.
US intelligence experts viewed the purges as a response to the discovery of widespread corruption in the military, including in the unit that manages the country’s expanding nuclear arsenal and would be critical to any invasion of Taiwan.
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China’s military has recently amended its audit rules to step up scrutiny over its budget, resources and assets, Defence Ministry spokesman Wu Qian said at a press briefing Thursday.
Wei’s fate sparked discussion when his name was missing from a list of retired cadres who received greetings from the top leadership in February. He was put under probe in September last year, according to state media, about one month after Li, who is accused of bribing other people.
Li’s expulsion likely opens up his spot on the party’s top military decision-making and commanding body, which is chaired by Xi. His replacement on the Central Military Commission could be announced at a long-delayed party conclave of senior officials next month.
China’s most-powerful leader since Mao Zedong has spent the past decade trying to reform the nation’s military and root out corruption from its ranks. The ongoing purges show those efforts are still not complete.
