After nearly a year of dismissal, Liu Zhiqiang, former Deputy Minister of the Chinese Communist Party’s Ministry of Justice, is under investigation. Liu Zhiqiang has had a career spanning the public security system and the judicial system, and all three former ministers of the Ministry of Justice he served under have been ousted.
According to a statement on April 30th from the website of the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and National Supervisory Commission, Liu Zhiqiang, former member of the party committee and deputy minister of the CCP Ministry of Justice, is currently undergoing disciplinary review and supervision investigation for “serious violations of discipline and laws.”
Public information shows that the 61-year-old Liu Zhiqiang is from Juancheng, Shandong Province. After graduating from the Department of English at the International College of Political Science, he served in the public security system for a long time. From 2004 to 2012, Liu Zhiqiang successively served as Deputy Director, Director of the Foreign Affairs Bureau of the CCP Ministry of Public Security, and Director of the International Cooperation Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security. In June 2012, he was appointed Deputy Governor of Qinghai Province and Director of the Provincial Public Security Department. In January 2016, he was transferred back to Beijing and appointed as a member of the party committee and deputy minister of the CCP Ministry of Justice until he was dismissed in June 2023.
With Liu Zhiqiang’s downfall, the number of centrally managed cadres reported to be under investigation by the CCP this year has increased to 23.
During Liu Zhiqiang’s tenure at the Ministry of Public Security, he served under the leadership of Zhou Yongkang and Meng Jianzhu, who were in charge of the Ministry of Public Security at different times.
In March this year, Liu Yuejin, former assistant minister of the CCP Ministry of Public Security, was investigated. He was also a subordinate who was highly valued by the former Minister of Public Security, Meng Jianzhu.
Among the five Ministers of Justice during Liu Zhiqiang’s tenure as Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Justice (Wu Aiyin, Zhang Jun, Fu Zhenghua, Tang Yijun, He Rong), three of them have since been ousted.
On October 14, 2017, former Minister of Justice Wu Aiyin was expelled from the party. Wu Aiyin served as Minister of Justice from July 2005 to February 2017.
In October 2021, Fu Zhenghua, then Vice Chairman of the Social and Legal Affairs Committee of the National Committee of CPPCC, was investigated and subsequently sentenced to death with a reprieve and life imprisonment. Fu Zhenghua served as Minister of Justice from March 2018 to April 2020.
Tang Yijun fell from grace on April 2, 2024, during his tenure as Chairman of the Jiangxi Provincial Committee of CPPCC. Tang Yijun served as Minister of Justice of the CCP in April 2020 and Chairman of the Jiangxi Provincial Committee of CPPCC in January 2023.