Village leader sentenced to death for murder

BEIJING, Dec 11, 2007 (AFP) - The head of a central Chinese village has been sentenced to death after being convicted of murdering six people following business and other disputes, state press said Tuesday.

Xing Guoping, 36, head of Liguizuo village in Henan province, was sentenced to death after killing two business partners and four other villagers in October this year, Xinhua news agency said.

The business partners were shot repeatedly in a dispute over profits at a jointly-run brick kiln, the report said.

Xing then went on to shoot four others in a neighbouring village because of arguments over local affairs, it said.

Village leaders in China are elected by locals in the only direct elections allowed in the nation of 1.3 billion people.

But the polls are often rife with corruption and vote-buying, and village leaders sometimes take advantage of their authority.

In June this year, four people were murdered just south of Beijing by a former head of their village who was ousted from his post following a corruption scandal.