China anti-graft campaign takes its toll in collateral damage

Lüliang, China

FOR 10 fat years, this mountainous corner of central China was synonymous with the nation's energy-hungry economic take-off. Its rich deposits of coal fuelled the most frenetic era of the Chinese boom, turning owners of small mines into millionaires and dirty towns into gleaming cities.

Now, Lüliang is at the centre of one of the most sweeping political and economic purges in recent Chinese history. As President Xi Jinping's campaign against corruption enters its second year, the Communist Party authorities have made an example of this district of 3.7 million, taking down much of its political and business elite in a flurry of headline-grabbing arrests.