China's ruling Communist Party accused disgraced politician Bo Xilai of abusing power, taking huge bribes and other crimes today to seal the fate of controversial leader whose fall shook a leadership succession due at a congress from November 8th.
Mr Bo faces a criminal investigation and will almost certainly end up in jail, and with the Communist Party congress nearly six weeks away, he might even be tried or indicted before that meeting.
"Bo Xilai's actions created grave repercussions and did massive harm to the reputation of the party and state, producing an extremely malign effect at home and abroad," the official statement from a party leaders' meeting said, according to a report by the official Xinhua news agency.
Mr Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, and his former police chief Wang Lijun have both already been jailed over the scandal stemming from the murder of British businessman Neil Heywood in the southwestern city of Chongqing, where Bo was Communist Party chief.
The official statement carried by Xinhua said that in the murder scandal, Bo "abused his powers of office, committed serious errors and bears a major responsibility".
Rumours that the party could secure Mr Bo, the "princeling" son of a communist revolutionary leader, a light punishment have now been dealt a fatal blow.
"Party organisations at all levels must use the case of Bo Xilai's grave disciplinary violations as a negative example," said the statement from the Politburo.
He has been expelled from the party as well as the elite decision-making Politburo and Central Committee "in view of his errors and culpability in the Wang Lijun incident and the intentional homicide case involving Bogu Kailai". Bogu is his wife's official but rarely used surname.
Wang, the one-time police chief and close ally of Mr Bo, has been jailed for 15 years on charges of defection and bribery, and for trying cover up the November 2011 murder of British businessman Neil Heywood by Mr Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai.
Mr Bo's "grave violations of party discipline" extended back to his time as an official in Dalian and Liaoning, and as minister of commerce, said the statement, carried by the state-run Xinhua news agency.
The announcement comes weeks before the Chinese Communist Party holds a congress that will unveil the country's new central leadership line-up.
Reuters