Zhou Yongkang

Zhou Yongkang (born 3 December 1942) is a former senior leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Born Zhou Yuangen in December 1942, Zhou is a native of Xiqiantou Village (西前头村), Wuxi County, in Jiangsu province.

Xiqiantou is located 18 km outside Wuxi city proper.

The majority of Xiqiantou residents were surnamed "Zhou".

Zhou took on the surname of his mother because his father, whose surname was Lu, was a 'live-in son-in-law' of his maternal grandparents.

Upon joining the Zhou household when he married, Zhou Yongkang's father took on his wife's surname and became known as Zhou Yisheng (周义生).

Zhou was the eldest of three sons.

Zhou's family was poor; his family made a living farming and fishing the Asian swamp eel.

Zhou was sent to school with the financial assistance of his family friends.

In 1954, Zhou was enrolled at one of the two top middle schools in the eastern Wuxi area.

It was during this period that Zhou changed his name to "Yongkang" on the advice of his teacher, because there was another person in his class with an identical name.

Zhou excelled at school, and was eventually accepted to enroll at the prestigious Suzhou High School, one of the most prominent secondary schools in the Jiangnan region.

Zhou had good grades and was involved in extra-curricular activities, including the school's political ideology group as well as the events promoting literacy.

In 1961, after obtaining stellar results on his Gaokao exams, he was admitted to the Beijing Institute of Petroleum (now China University of Petroleum) soon after, and became the pride of his village.

He majored in geophysical survey and exploration.

In November 1964 Zhou became a member of the Chinese Communist Party.

In 1966, the Cultural Revolution ensnared Beijing's higher education institutions.

Zhou was told by the authorities to "wait for an assignment" while the political struggles wreaked Havoc on China's universities.

He waited for a year.

He joined geological survey work in north-east China in 1967, assigned to become an intern technician at factory No. 673 at the Daqing oil field.

In 1970, Zhou was promoted to lead the geological survey division of a local department charged with carrying out an ambitious petroleum drilling initiative set out by the Party's top leadership.

In 1973, Zhou Yongkang was promoted to head the Geophysical Exploration Department of the Liaohe Petroleum Exploration Bureau, located in Panjin, Liaoning.

Liaohe would eventually become one of the China National Petroleum Corporation's (CNPC) largest oil fields.

Zhou was seen as a hard-working and emotionally mature presence to his colleagues; he did not drink or smoke, and would rarely speak based on script.

He would reputedly talk unscripted for hours on end while keeping his colleagues engaged.

At Liaohe, Zhou met Wang Shuhua, a factory worker from Hebei province, whom he later married.

He was at the helm of the China National Petroleum Corporation between 1996 and 1998, then became Minister of Land and Natural Resources until 1999, and subsequently Party Secretary of Sichuan, then China's second most populous province.

He served as the Minister of Public Security from 2002 to 2007, before being promoted to the PSC.

Zhou was a State Councilor of the State Council from 2003 to 2008 and also a member of the Party Secretariat of the Central Committee.

He was a member of the 17th Politburo Standing Committee (PSC), China's highest decision-making body, and the Secretary of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (Zhengfawei) between 2007 and 2012, making him one of the most powerful leaders in China.

In that position, Zhou oversaw China's security apparatus and law enforcement institutions, with power stretching into courts, prosecution agencies, police forces, paramilitary forces, and intelligence organs.

Zhou retired at the 18th Party Congress in 2012.

In late 2013, Zhou was placed under investigation for alleged abuse of power and corruption, a decision state media announced in July 2014.

Zhou was the first Politburo Standing Committee member – and the most senior-ranked official – since the founding of the People's Republic of China to be tried and convicted of corruption-related charges.

Following his investigation, Zhou was expelled from the CCP.

He was convicted of corruption-related charges in 2014 and expelled from the CCP in the same year.

Zhou rose through the ranks of the CCP through his involvement in the oil and gas industry, starting as a technician on the Daqing oil field during the Cultural Revolution.

On June 11, 2015, Zhou was convicted of bribery, abuse of power and the intentional disclosure of state secrets by the Intermediate Court in Tianjin.

Zhou and his family members were said to have taken 129 million yuan (over $20 million) in bribes.

He was sentenced to life in prison.