A former city official overseeing construction of the Yiwu Trade City project was given an 18-year jail term on bribery charges on Monday in east China's Zhejiang Province.

The Intermediate People's Court in Jinhua City gave the sentence to Yang Yanhu, former member of the standing committee of the Yiwu municipal committee of the Communist Party of China, at the first trial.

The 59-year-old was also the former deputy head of the city's legislature and commander of the construction project of the Yiwu Trade City, a 700 million-yuan building project.

The court found Yang guilty of taking bribes worth 570,000 yuan (83,000 U.S. dollars), and abusing his power in land requisition and rebuilding on the construction project.

The corrupt official was found to have defrauded land use with fake building certificates, which caused state assets losses worth 2 million yuan.

The court on Monday also confiscated 300,000 yuan of Yang's illegal earning.

(Xinhua News Agency December 16, 2008)