China has arbitrary rule of law: report

An editorial opinion piece in  The Washington Post notes that the news from China on Friday would seem to point to a political system reacting appropriately to high-level wrongdoing. The former boss of Chongqing, Bo Xilai, at one time among China's most powerful regional figures, was expelled from the Communist Party and, according to official news media, faced charges of corruption.

Bo's wife had been suspended earlier and given a suspended death sentence for murdering a British businessman. The editorial says that  Bo is a son of one of the party's revolutionary founders, and it must have been a particularly agonising decision for the secretive party clique that rules China.

However whether the official version of events in Chongqing matched what really happened, given China's opaque court system and controlled media, there was no way to know, the article said. A better idea of how the law is used in China is provided by a decision that came Thursday from Beijing's No2 People's Intermediate Court.

Dissident artist Ai's second and final appeal against a $2.4-million fine for tax evasion was rejected by the court. Ai had accused the tax bureau of violation of laws in handling witnesses and gathering evidence in his case.

The claims were abruptly dismissed by the court, in a ruling delivered by telephone.  Ai, who underwent 81 days incarceration last year in a crackdown on dissidents, has long maintained the tax fine was in retaliation for his outspoken criticism of China's abuse of human rights. Even as authorities have retained Ai's passport, preventing him from attending exhibitions of his work abroad, Ai has refused to be silenced.

He said what surprised him was that China which was developing at a rapid rate had the most barbaric and backward legal system. He said he thought it was a bad omen.