Mayor of Shijiazhuang sacked over tainted milk powder scandal
18/9/2008 17:49
The mayor of Shijiazhuang, capital of north China's Hebei Province, was
sacked in Shijiazhuang today over a tainted milk powder scandal.
The
dismissal of Ji Chuntang was made at the local legislature, one day after Ji was
removed from his post as vice secretary of the Shijiazhuang Municipal Committee
of the Communist Party of China (CPC).
The dairy giant Sanlu Group, based in
Shijiazhuang, was the first company exposed in the scandal. More than 6,200
infants across the country had developed kidney stones after drinking Sanlu's
tainted baby formula, including three who have died.
Four officials in
Shijiazhuang had been fired before Ji Chuntang. They included vice mayor in
charge of agricultural production, head of animal husbandry and fishery bureau,
director of food and drug administration and head of quality supervision
bureau.
Hebei police have so far arrested 18 suspects connected to the baby
milk powder scandal. Six of them allegedly sold the industrial chemical melamine
to milk dealers, while the other 12 were milk dealers who added the chemical to
milk and sold the tainted milk to dairy companies.
Xinhua
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