PNN – Members of the National Assembly of China reviewed the anti-corruption law amendment bill for the first time.
According to the report of Pakistan News Network from the website of the National Assembly of China, the draft amendment of the anti-corruption law was discussed for the first time in the four-day meeting of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Assembly (NPC), which is considered the country’s highest legislative body, yesterday.
According to this report, inspectors are allowed to compel a person who is suspected of serious management or committing a crime through abuse of power to appear for investigation.
The bill also specifies that investigators can only detain a suspect for 12 hours under normal conditions, and up to 24 hours if necessary based on the suspect’s mental condition. But they cannot detain the suspect indefinitely with frequent extensions.
In addition, one of the notes of this bill allows the investigators to keep the suspects of minor crimes in a detention center; Even if the suspect is not officially arrested, there are “real security risks” such as escape or suicide.
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In such a situation, investigators must transfer the suspect to detention centers within 24 hours and decide within seven days whether to formally arrest or release him.
It is also stated in this bill that bail permits the release of minor crime suspects for a maximum of 12 months.
According to the current law, anti-corruption investigators are allowed to detain a suspect who works in the public or government sectors in a designated center for a maximum of 6 months. But with this new bill, inspectors are only allowed to increase the period of detention of a person by another 2 months.
However, the extension of the detention period needs approval from China’s top anti-corruption body, the National Supervisory Commission, which is basically the same body as the Central Disciplinary Inspection Committee of the Communist Party of China.
In addition, this bill adds that if the anti-corruption institution at the provincial level realizes that the suspect has committed other serious crimes, it can submit a request to the national institution to extend the period of detention up to eight months.
This change means that suspects in cases of financial or moral corruption may be denied access to a lawyer before the prosecutor examines their case.
According to the data of China’s Central Disciplinary Inspection Commission, in 2023, about 26,000 of the country’s senior officials have received disciplinary arrest warrants.