China's top auditor has sent a special team to China Telecom, a giant state-owned communication server, to audit its 2004 income, expenditure and the economic responsibility of the company's former director, Zhou Deqiang.

The audit by the National Audit Office (NAO) began May 9th in China Telecom's headquarters and six provincial branches.

The audit team has been authorized to check the financial records, investigate and collect evidence, impose monetary penalties and publicize the audit report, according to Huang Daoguo, director of the team.

China Telecom has established a coordinate leading group to cooperate with the audit team, and all local branches also have been ordered to respond to the team's requests, said Wang Xiaochu, board chairman and general manager of the company.

China Telecom has assets of 540 billion yuan (65.3 billion US dollars), 21 provincial branches and covers 70 percent of the country's long-distance telecommunication network.

Different from the audit on governmental departments, the audit on companies will stress on the advice service to improve the company's operation, said Liu Guoquan, director of the economic and trade department under the NAO.

Chinese central leaders, especially Premier Wen Jiabao, have urged the improvement of economic audit work, and vowed to treat audit results as important reference in evaluating and promoting/demoting cadres.

China has decided to expand the scope of economic audit of government officials to heads of prefecture-level agencies from Jan. 1 of 2005, as were officials of lower ranks.

From 2000 to June 2004, 3,253 officials in China were handed over to judicial or discipline organs to face trial and punishment after economic auditing, according to the NAO.

(Xinhua News Agency May 24, 2005)