Yu Zhendong, a man accused of the biggest embezzlement...

Yu Zhendong, a man accused of the biggest embezzlement in recent Chinese history, was extradited from Las Vegas to Beijing. The return of Yu, a banker said to have stolen $485m (about £270m) from his institution, was a sign of growing Sino-American cooperation in law enforcement. Formerly a safe haven, the US was no longer welcoming enemies of the Chinese Communist party as unreservedly as in the past. As the relations between the two countries grew warmer, President George Bush recently ordered US immigration authorities to bar any public official suspected of corruption in China. According to the US embassy in Beijing Yu was accused of conspiring with two fellow employees to embezzle the money from the Bank of China, one of the countries four biggest financial institutions, between 1992 and 2001. The three men were said to have used fake Hong Kong travel documents to flee to the US. Mr Yu, 41, was arrested in December 2002 and charged with racketeering. His alleged partners Xu Guojun and Xu Chaofan are still at large. Although the US and China have no extradition treaty, American officials agreed to surrender him on the condition that he would not be tortured or given the death penalty, which was common in China even for less serious corruption cases.