BEIJING (AP) – The head of the bureau that gathers China’s economic data is under investigation by the anti-graft agency in a possible expansion of an anticorruption campaign that has shaken state companies and securities firms.
Wang Bao’an, chairman of the National Bureau of Statistics and a former deputy finance minister, is suspected of “severe disciplinary violations,” the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said in a statement Tuesday. It gave no details.
Dozens of senior figures in China’s state-owned industry, finance firms and regulatory agencies have been detained in a 4-year-old anti-corruption crackdown led by President Xi Jinping.
Just hours before Tuesday’s announcement, Wang had briefed reporters at a news conference about China’s economic performance in 2015.
Wang, 52, was appointed chief of the statistics bureau last April after serving 24 years in the Ministry of Finance.