Chen Tonghai, the former head of Sinopec, China's largest company, has been given a suspended death sentence after being convicted of taking $28.8m (€20.4m, £17.5m) in bribes over his eight years as a senior executive.
Mr Chen was chairman of state-owned China Petroleum & Chemical Group, better known as Sinopec, from 1999 until his detention in 2007 as he tried to flee the country.
The bribes total, detailed for the first time yesterday, adds up to one of the largesttaken by a Chinese official, according to public records. The largest single bribe, according to local media, was the $12m paid to a vice-mayor in charge of construction in Suzhou, a prosperous industrial city near Shanghai, in a case tried this year.