China party says nearly 5 million members probed for graft

BEIJING (AP) — China’s ruling Communist Party says it has investigated almost 5 million members for possible corruption over the last decade, with formal criminal cases brought against 553. At a briefing Monday on the sidelines of the party’s national congress held every five years, the party’s Committee for Discipline and Inspection said 207,000 party officials in total had been handed some form of punishment. Xi Jinping, now seeking a third term as party leader, has made fighting corruption a hallmark of his decade in power. Xi’s anti-graft campaign is largely popular with the public but at times has been seen as a way of sidelining political rivals and enforcing surveillance over society as a whole.