Career

He was the president of the Beijing-based Jianhao Group. He was convicted of murder and executed in March 2006, after what appeared to be a feud with Sichuan businessman Liu Han. Yuan was raised in an ordinary family of peasants.

After making his fortune in Beijing, he was nicknamed "Beijing"s Li Ka-shing".

Yuan lost nearly 100 million yuan in futures trading, and believed that it was caused by the Sichuan businessman Liu Han"s manipulation of a broker. He offered a former policeman, Wang Xing, 160,000 yuan for Liu"s life.

Wang in turn hired the contract killer Li Haiyang. In February 1997, Li shot at Liu twice in a Sichuan hotel but missed him.

Li was captured and later sentenced to life in prison.

Yuan was found guilty of the murder in January 2005 and was due to die by firing squad on 14 October 2005.

Achievements

• The day before the execution date, his wife, Zhuoma, a Tibetan dancer, transferred ownership of shares worth 49.5 billion yuan to the government, including shares of an Indonesian oilfield, hoping to win some time to reverse the sentence. Yuan won a stay of execution until March 2006.

Membership

At the time of Yuan"s execution, Zhou was the Minister of Public Security and a member of the Political Bureau.