A court in Vietnam on Monday sentenced a former politburo official to 13 years in prison and another high-profile energy official to life imprisonment for embezzlement and violating state rules, in a corruption crackdown, state media said.
Dinh La Thang, a former politburo official and the most senior Vietnamese politician tried in decades, was jailed for 13 years for “deliberate violation of state regulations on economic management that caused serious consequences,” state-run Voice of Vietnam and the Vietnam News Agency said.
Trinh Xuan Thanh, a high-profile official whom Germany said Vietnamese agents kidnapped in a Berlin park in a scene reminiscent of Cold War disappearances, was sentenced to life in prison for both violating state regulations and embezzlement.
Their sentencing concluded the trial of 22 people connected to violations at state oil and gas group PetroVietnam’s (PVN) thermal power project that caused losses of 119 billion dong ($5 million) for PVN, according to Reuters.
More trials are expected this year as part of a Communist party-led crackdown the government says is targeting fraud and mismanagement. Both Thang and Thanh were prosecuted for other corruption cases, separate from Monday’s case.
Critics say the crackdown is also politically motivated, however, and is targeting those close to former premier Nguyen Tan Dung after the influence of Vietnam’s conservative security forces grew in 2016 following a power struggle in the party.