Chinese Prosecutors probed 9,582 commercial bribery cases involving public servants in 2006 Xinhua has learnt from the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP).

As much as 1.5 billion yuan (US$192 million) were involved in these cases, the SPP said.

The SPP's crackdown on commercial bribery had been focusing in 15 areas including land sales, social security funds, medical care, government purchase, the bankruptcy and restructuring of state-owned enterprises.

The investigation of several cases involving high-ranking officials has helped check the spreading of commercial bribery, SPP sources said.

Among them is Zhang Enzhao, former president of the China Construction Bank, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison in November 2006, for taking bribes totaling 4.2 million yuan (about US$538,000).

Xu Fangming, former director of the finance department of China's Ministry of Finance, was sentenced to 13 years in prison in November 2006for taking bribes worth of 2.15 million yuan.

(Xinhua News Agency February 21, 2007)