China: Top Party Official Jailed for Corruption

Lu Xiwen also ran Beijing’s party school that trains rising officials, and between 2001 and 2015 used "the convenience of her office" to take bribes worth 18.8 million yuan ($US 2.73 million), said the court in Jilin City, some 1,079 km northeast of Beijing.

Authorities put Lu under investigation in 2015, according to Reuters.

Because Lu confessed to her crimes, repented and actively returned all stolen goods, she was given a lighter sentence, state media reported.

Lu is the latest official to be jailed in President Xi Jinping’s extensive campaign against deep-seated corruption among officials.

The anti-corruption campaign has faced criticism, however. Chinese writer and critic of the Communist Party Murong Xuecun likened Xi’s campaign to a "Stalinist political purge."

"He relies on the regulations of the party and not on the laws of the state, the people carrying it out operate like the KGB, and most cases cannot be reported on with any transparency," Murong wrote in a New York Times opinion article.