Shanghai Political and Legal Affairs Commission (PLAC) officials belonging to the cohort of ex-Shanghai chief prosecutor Chen Xu are “all rotten,” said Zheng Enchong. “There isn’t a single decent soul in the PLAC.”
Speaking to The Epoch Times after Chen’s expulsion from the Party for corruption on May 25, Zheng revealed details of Chen’s malfeasance, and added that Chen’s downfall will likely implicate Chen’s superiors and former PLAC elites Liu Yungeng and Wu Zhiming.
Zheng, a 66-year-old human rights lawyer based in Shanghai, has first hand experience of the sort of injustices doled out by the Shanghai PLAC, a Communist Party apparatus that oversees the courts, the prisons, and the police.
In 2003, Zheng was sentenced to three years in jail for defending local families who were disenfranchised by members of the “Shanghai Gang,” a power political clique headed by former Party boss Jiang Zemin. Upon his release, Zheng was immediately placed under house arrest, and has remained confined ever since. Chinese security officers would occasionally whisk Zheng away to detention facilities and brutally torture him.
Zheng, however, has seen a relaxation in his confinement in recent years with the purge of Shanghai officials under Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign.
Zheng Enchong noted that the purged ex-Shanghai prosecutor Chen Xu continued to run private casinos and entertainment facilities despite Xi placing greater emphasis on Party discipline shortly after coming to office in 2012.
Chen, Zheng said, even would play a leading role in shielding the many Shanghai security officials who frequent prostitutes. Chen also used his position to block the investigation into senior Shanghai elites.
Zheng believes that Chen’s investigation and removal affords Xi an opening to bag even more prominent members of the Shanghai Gang.
“Great job arresting Chen Xu,” Zheng Enchong said. “Now Liu Yungeng must be taken down.”
Liu Yungeng was once Chen’s former overall in charge, having occupied the position of PLAC chief from 2000 to 2002 before his promotion to deputy Party secretary of Shanghai. Zheng said that Liu’s swift career progression was due to his gaining the confidence of top Shanghai Gang elites, such as former vice premier Huang Ju and Jiang Zemin, through his brutal handling of local petitioners and Falun Gong practitioners.
“Liu Yungeng oversaw all the cruel torture taking place in Shanghai,” Zheng said. “Many people have died; Liu was entirely responsible for live organ harvesting and other wicked acts.”
Practitioners of Falun Gong, a traditional Chinese spiritual practice that is the target of a brutal persecution campaign launched by Jiang in July 1999, form the largest group of prisoners of conscience in China today. Many practitioners suffer brutal abuse and torture in detention, and are also most at risk of being killed by the Chinese regime for their organs.
“The people of Shanghai are extremely furious with Liu Yungeng … so many Falun Gong practitioners have died at his hands,” Zheng said. “Shanghai residence won’t be appeased if Liu, the dark political backer of Chen Xu, isn’t removed.”
Chinese state media stated that Chen’s case has led to the investigations of over a hundred judicial officials. It is unclear if these officials include those in the Communist Party’s PLAC.
Zheng Enchong believes that Chen’s imminent prosecution, as well as the sidelining of Zheng Wanxin and Zheng Shanhe—both high ranking Shanghai PLAC officials—bodes ill for former Shanghai PLAC chief Wu Zhiming. Wu is the nephew of Jiang Zemin and a leading member of the Shanghai Gang.
Wu Zhiming and Liu Yungeng are both listed by the United States-based non governmental group World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong as being responsible for multiple Falun Gong persecution cases in Shanghai.
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