176 Chinese procurators punished in 2011

BEIJING - China's procuratorates punished 176 procurators for violating laws and regulations in 2011 as part of their efforts to fight corruption, China's top procurator Cao Jianming told the country's top legislature on Sunday.

Of those procurators punished, 20 were under investigation for criminal charges, Cao, prosecutor-general of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP), said in a report delivered at the annual session of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature.

He said the SPP launched a number of inspections over procurators last year to make sure they observed clean standards and be self-disciplined, while putting procuratorates under the supervision of legislators, political advisors and the public.

The SPP trained 119,000 procurators, including 946 procurators for the western regions, and openly selected and recruited procurators from the society last year in  a bid to make procurators more professional, Cao said.

The top procurator said there are still many outstanding problems involving the procuratorate work, acknowledging that procuratorates do not perform as well as they have been expected by the public.

The overall quality of procurators needs to be improved, as some procurators are not professional enough and lack the ability to properly apply the law and handle complicated cases.