China Charges Wife of Ousted Party Leader in Briton’s Death
BEIJING — Gu Kailai, the wife of the disgraced political leader Bo Xilai, has been charged with the intentional homicide of a British businessman, a crime that triggered China’s most serious political crisis in decades, the state media reported Thursday evening.
The official Xinhua news agency published a brief dispatch announcing that Ms. Gu and an aide employed by the family had been formally charged in the poisoning death of Neil Heywood, the 41-year-old Briton whose body was found in November in a hotel in Chongqing, the municipality in southwest China led by Mr. Bo until he was deposed by Communist Party leaders.
Although the announcement repeated earlier accusations that tied the murder of Mr. Heywood to “a conflict over economic interests,” it added fresh detail, saying that Ms. Gu committed the crime in order to protect her son, Bo Guagua. The article did not mention Mr. Bo’s full name, suggesting prosecutors have decided not to implicate him in the crime.
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