"Zhou Yongkang, China's former domestic security chief, was sentenced to life in prison on Thursday for accepting bribes, abuse of power and revealing state secrets, China's state-run Xinhua news agency reported. Mr. Zhou, 72, was tried in secret in the northeastern city of Tianjin. A member of the elite Politburo Standing Committee from 2007 until 2012, he is the most senior leader, sitting or retired, to be sentenced to prison for corruption in more than 65 years of Communist Party rule," writes The New York Times
The Associated Press reports, "Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi met Thursday with Chinese President Xi Jinping during a visit to Beijing aimed at building ties with her country's powerful neighbor... No public events are scheduled during Suu Kyi's low-key five-day visit. China hopes to use the meetings to shore up its declining influence in Myanmar following democratic reforms that have seen the Southeast Asian country shift away from Beijing and toward Western nations, Japan and other potential investors."
The Diplomat writes, "China's minister of finance, Lou Jiwei, hosted his Japanese counterpart, Taro Aso (who is also Japan's deputy prime minister) in Beijing for the fifth round of the China-Japan Finance Dialogue. It was the first time the previously annual dialogue had been held since April 2012... The meeting between Lou and Aso was thus another welcome sign of a growing thaw in China-Japan relations. The two countries were barely on speaking terms for around two years...The ice was not broken until November 2014, when China and Japan reached a four-point consensus wherein both sides agreed to 'gradually resume political, diplomatic and security dialogue through various multilateral and bilateral channels."