国内英语新闻:Government depts urged to correct financial wrongdoing

BEIJING, July 2 (Xinhua) -- China's central government has ordered sweeping correction of departmental wrongdoing in money use exposed by auditors last week.

At a State Council meeting on Wednesday, departments and institutions named in the annual audit report were ordered to list their problems and give a detailed timetable for each correction.

The corrections must be finished before the end of October, and the results will be publicized after being reported to the top legislature, according to a statement from the meeting, which was presided over by Premier Li Keqiang.

The National Audit Office's (NAC) 2013 report exposed the malpractice and corruption of a number of government departments, banks and state-owned enterprises, concerning theft of poverty relief funds, embezzlement, luxurious overseas trips and feasts.

For instance, the Ministry of Culture and two public institutions embezzled 104 million yuan (17 mln U.S. dollars) and spent 30 percent of it on gifts and giving out allowances. The eight state-owned banks, including the ICBC, were found to have lent 375 billion yuan to companies barred from gaining such loans.

The NAC helped uncover evidence of 314 serious cases of "law and disciplinary violations," involving 1,100 people.

At Wednesday's meeting, the State Council asked authorities and institutions to make use of money that remained from previous years and avoid wasting spare funds.

It also urged them to increase investment in the real economy to help with small companies' financing.

The State Council will cut more administrative approval items and delegate more power in this aspect, including the right to allocate funds, to authorities at lower levels, it vowed.

It also called for improvements in the budgetary system's transparency and strengthened supervision and auditing to ensure the correct use of public money.