Bo Xilai suspected of laundering money through Macau

Bo Xilai, then China’s Minister of Commerce, rubs his face at a memorial ceremony for his father Bo Yibo

The former Chongqing Communist Party chief, Bo Xilai, is being investigated for laundering money through Macau, The Times reported on Monday, speaking of an “illicit fortune.” According to the British newspaper, mainland Chinese prosecutors are understood to have secretly rounded up a group of six men late last month who have alleged links to a money laundering operation “in the world’s most lucrative gambling enclave”, namely, the junket business.
Quoting a “source with close links to the Macau police”, the paper writes that the men were being interrogated about a corruption case involving a “former senior Chinese official.”
It is believed the move comes amid speculation that Bo will face trial before March. The former leader was ejected from the elite ranks of China’s Communist Party and Politburo and has not been seen in public since March. Government media reported that he was being investigated within the party for alleged crimes including abuse of power, bribe-taking and involvement in his wife’s murder of the British businessman Neil Heywood, who died in Chongqing in November last year.