Four defendants in the Rio Tinto case, including Australian national Stern Hu (pictured left), were handed jail terms from seven to 14 years for bribery and stealing commercial secrets by a Chinese court yesterday. The verdict was handed down by the Shanghai No.1 Intermediate People's Court. Stern Hu was sentenced to 10 years in jail for bribery and stealing commercial secrets, with his assets confiscated and a fine of 1 million yuan (US$146,413). Wang Yong received a jail term of 14 years, with his assets confiscated and a fine of 5.2 million yuan. Ge Minqiang was sentenced to eight years in jail, with his assets confiscated and a fine of 800,000 yuan. Liu Caikui received a jail term of seven years, with his assets confiscated and a fine of 700,000 yuan. You can see many more stories on this case here.

Every man and his dog will have something to say on this, and you can read most of it at the link above...

See full story here. The line that got me was this:

National police corruption crimes director Yovianus Mahar told reporters late Tuesday: "From the results of the questioning, we raised [Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) deputy chairmen Chandra Hamzah and Bibit Samad Rianto's] status from witnesses to suspects. They are accused of misusing authority... and forcing people to hand over something."

From witnesses to suspects? That can't be good for anti-corruption in Indonesia...

A 27-year-old bank manager stole 40 million yuan (US$5.86 million) from a semi-official government body to pay off his gambling debts, a Shenzhen court heard last week. Mr Luo was appointed head of an unnamed bank branch in Pingshan, Longgang, in 2007 and almost immediately began making frequent trips to Macao casinos. Luo gambled away about 34 million yuan at Macao casinos in 2007, using money from a residents' committee - a semi-official body subsidised by the government - in Longgang in December 2007. He borrowed 40 million yuan from the committee, promising to repay the fund within 10 days with an interest rate of 8 percent, the court heard. A verdict has yet to be handed down from the court. (see more here).

This is an interesting story from the BBC about how corruption is being tackled at Nepal's airport.  The 'Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority' reports that it had sent a team to the airport to "observe the growing complaints about the behaviour of airport authorities and workers towards travellers".  The solution they came up with: staff at Nepal's main international airport are to be issued trousers without pockets.  Corruption is a unique challenge for all businesses, this is one practical step (although I have witnessed staff at airports hiding bribes under keyboards and in leaflets so perhaps the no pockets approach won't be 100% effective).   In this weeks CSR Asia Weekly we will have a review of Transparency International's 2009 Global Corruption Barometer, which includes information that shows half of surveyed respondents would pay more to buy from a corruption free company.  Is it feasible?