More than three years after Zhao Faqi, the party involved in the "Shaanxi 100 Billion Mining Rights Case" disappeared, his family learned of his whereabouts again, but Zhao Faqi was sentenced to seven and a half years in prison for "illegal acquisition of state secrets". This lawsuit involving Zhou Qiang, President of the Supreme Court of China, how huge of interests are involved, and there must be Chinese private entrepreneurs like Zhao Faqi to bear the price of winning the contract lawsuit and losing personal freedom? How many obstacles will there be in establishing a rule-of-law society in China?
People familiar with the matter: "Shaanxi 100 billion mineral rights case" case file loss case held in secret
On December 21 , 2017 , it was supposed to be the tenOne day when Zhao Faqi was relieved of his heavy burden, the Supreme People's Court of China decided in the second-instance judgment that day, that the contract signed by Zhao Faqi's Kaiqilai Energy Investment Co., Ltd. and the Shaanxi Provincial Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources (later known as the Western Exploration Institute) for the mining of coal mining rights is valid. should continue.
This case involves the ownership of the mineral rights of the Boluo mine field worth 100 billion yuan , with an area of 339 square kilometers, a geological reserve of 1.568 billion tons, and a recoverable volume of nearly 1.1 billion tons in Yuheng mining area, Hengshan County, Yulin, northern Shaanxi. The North Hundred Billion Mining Rights Case”, Zhao Faqi won the lawsuit for many years, but he didn’t dig up a ton of coal, and even touched a whole body of ashes that he couldn’t shake, and he had to go to jail.
"All they did is to take away our exploration rights . Wang Linqing said that my husband instructed him to secretly photograph the file, so I asked. From the beginning to the end, Wang Linqing and my husband were tried separately, and they were all secret. During the trial, the two did not confront each other. Isn't this not even complying with basic legal procedures and not even acting?" Zhao Faqi's wife, Ms. Li, was under enormous physical and mental safety pressure and questioned the trial in a written interview with this station. legitimacy.
Doubt 1: Court surveillance ingenious black screen file disappears and reappears
Wang Linqing was one of the court judges in charge of hearing the contract dispute between Zhao Faqi v. Xikanyuan. The first thing to clarify is that at the end of December 2018 , due to the revelation by the former CCTV host Cui Yongyuan, the outside world learned that the second-instance case involving Zhao Faqi’s 100 billion mineral rights contract case disappeared mysteriously, and Wang Linqing claimed to be under enormous pressure from higher-level leaders.
At that time, Cui Yongyuan pointed out that Zhou Qiang, the president of the Supreme People's Court, was the mastermind behind the scenes. "In the Supreme Court, which can't even get in a mouse, the trial file can be said to be lost."
The Supreme Court denied the disappearance of the second-instance dossier for the first time. After Chinese public opinion boiled over, the Political and Legal Committee of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China intervened in early 2019 and established a multi-department investigation team. After Wang Linqing was taken away and became another criminal who pleaded guilty on CCTV, Zhao Faqi also involved.
However, according to Caixin, a recorded conversation between Wang Linqing and Cheng Xinwen, the chief of the trial division at the time, showed that when Wang Linqing was asked to supplement the file, he found that some of the lost files had miraculously returned, but without the key leadership instructions, Minutes and other contents; Caixin reported at the time that Wang Linqing believed that some important contents of the dossier had been stolen, and Cheng Xinwen also asked Wang Linqing, "Do you suspect that he stole it?
Ms. Li also wanted to ask, "Why does the judgment say that Wang Linqing said that my husband instructed him to secretly photograph the dossier? We can't instruct him to photograph something that doesn't exist."
Doubt 2: The accused and the accuser have no chance to confront each other in court
A Chinese legal person familiar with the case told reporters, "Zhao Faqi's case shows that in the current judicial practice in China, as long as a state secret is involved, the trial can be held privately. Like Zhao Faqi's case, the accused party should indeed be with the court. The accusers have the opportunity to confront each other in court, but China's judicial environment does not currently have such conditions." The legal person declined to be named for security reasons.
Doubt 3: State secrets become the umbrella for private trials
Ms. Li relayed the opinion of Mo Shaoping, the second-instance attorney in the case of Zhao Faqi's "illegal acquisition of state secrets", saying that Mo Shaoping believes that Zhao Faqi's case has "unclear facts and unclear evidence", and whether it involves the state Confidentiality is also in question. But obviously Mo Shaoping's opinion was not accepted by the court.
"We presented new evidence and new witnesses. The court hurriedly pronounced the verdict without even a trial , and neither kept records nor written . " Ms. Li sighed.
She also pointed out that the so-called case of Zhao Faqi's alleged acquisition of state secrets was tried in secret without a defense lawyer in the first instance.
Zhou Qiang and Zhao Leji 's faction and the struggle for power and money?
On August 25 , 2003 , Zhao Faqi signed the "Cooperative Exploration Contract" with the Western Exploration Institute. At that time, there were Li Jianguo and Zhao Leji successively as the secretaries of the Shaanxi Provincial Party Committee. It was not until the end of 2012 that Zhao Leji went to Beijing to serve as the secretary of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the head of the organization.
Zhao Zhengyong, who later took over as secretary of the Shaanxi Provincial Party Committee, was involved in a bribery case involving up to 700 million yuan under Zhao Faqi's report. In 2020 , he was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve, which was later reduced to life imprisonment, with no commutation. Parole.
The station has repeatedly tried to dial the online switchboard and reporting phone number of the Supreme People's Court of China, but no one answered, or the line was automatically disconnected after one or two beeps. On the other hand, the phone number of the Party Committee of the Shaanxi Provincial Organs was blocked.
Are there higher people's courts on the Supreme People's Court?
Hu Ping, editor-in-chief of "Beijing Spring" magazine, told reporters that from Cui Yongyuan's revelations in 2019 to the establishment of a working group by the central government to intervene, the CCP's official statements and practices are not only inconsistent and full of flaws, but also highlight that China's laws serve the party.
"The fact that the joint investigation team came forward to identify or investigate the Supreme Court's decision is completely absurd. This is what some lawyers have said. Isn't this investigation team becoming a higher court? This alone completely violates the rule of law. "Hu Ping said.
He described the absurdity of the procedure and the flaws in its content , which reflected the power struggle and operation of the CCP, but there was no public trial procedure that put Zhao Faqi and Wang Linqing in jail.
Ms. Li was reluctant to accept anything, she insisted that Zhao Faqi was innocent.
From this point of view , the interests involved in the ownership of the 100 billion mineral rights are complex, the excavation of black gold is not easy, and the Chinese judiciary has not been able to become a light in Zhao Faqi's case.
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