China's rail ministry in colossal debt (€214 billion)

CIE

Business Insider

Only way out now is to issue more debt in the form of bonds.

foggy_lad

Su Shunhu, the deputy chief of the transport bureau of the Railways ministry has been detained as part of the graft probe that has already seen his minister, Liu Zhijun, toppled.

Mr Su's boss, Zhang Shuguang, the deputy chief engineer of the bureau, has also been detained and the Chinese media has speculated he may have as much as £1.7 billion stashed away in overseas accounts.

The Chinese Railways ministry has just unveiled its flagship Beijing to Shanghai high-speed rail link but is hugely in debt and has been widely criticised for its lack of transparency and openness.

Liu, who ran the £180 billion high-speed rail budget for eight years and was known as "Great Leap Liu" for his ambitious expansion plans, was removed from his job in February.

According to the state media, Su is suspected of having abused his position to help a coal mine owner in Inner Mongolia move his coal using the rail network.

In June, three senior officials at Nanchang Railway Bureau and Hohhot Railway Bureau were put under investigation, signaling fights with corruption have reached local railway authorities.

In a separate investigation, Duan Zhenhao, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was also detained today (FRI) for suspected corruption and is thought to have misused scientific funding.

Last week, China executed two former vice-mayors from Hangzhou and Suzhou for graft.

Xu Maiyong, the former vice-mayor of Hangzhou, and Jiang Renjie, the former vice-mayor of Suzhou, were convicted of taking more than £10 million of bribes between them in connection with property developments.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/8654045/Chinese-railways-corruption-probe-claims-another-scalp.html

In places like China when stuff like this happens the heads roll(sometimes literally) from the top down not like in Ireland!

CIE

Perhaps, but nothing gets solved. They just like making the heads roll.

dermo88

While €214 billion is a colossal amount of money by anyones terms, it should be seen in the context of the actual size of China and its population.

China is building a system that will link numerous Megacities of 10 Million+ population.
China is a country which is diverse and vast.
China is learning not to go down the route of car dependency like America or Europe. They do not want to waste scarce resources.

Corruption, cover ups and bribery are an Asian curse. Asians prefer to use the term tradition or 'way of life' to describe corruption.
Corruption lead to the unequal treaties between the Western powers and the Chinese Empire prior to its collapse in 1911.
Corruption lead to millions of chinese emigrating overseas, as their nation distintegrated into conflict, chaos, famine, civil war, genocide, destruction
Corruption destroyed the first Chinese Republic under Sun Yat Sen and Chiang Kai Shek, lead to the invasion of Manchukuo by the Japanese in the 1930's. This is why the Chinese Government will execute anyone found guilty of corruption, simply because there is a burned painful memory of the damage it has done to the Chinese people over the centuries, and one which they are trying to address and control. It is also why the Chinese government tends to be iron fisted. It needs to be for the time being, otherwise there is a huge risk of a repeat of that disintegration and the consequences of such will be catastrophic with global implications which nobody can comprehend.

While I am no fanboy of the Peoples Republic of China, and sympathise with the Taiwanese side of that divide (they ARE transparent), they are developing at an unprecedented pace. Never in the history of mankind has a nation progressed so far, so fast.

This will lead to competition for scarce resources, and with 1.2 Billion people with a desire for a Western standard of living, an incomprehensible paradigm shift is taking place.

China has waited hundreds of years to return to the World stage with a high profile. Napoleon Bonapartes words, stated 200 years ago ring through the centuries.

"Let China sleep for when she awakes, the world will tremble"

Or.....I prefer this chinese blessing, or a curse.

"May you live in interesting times"