Zhou Yongkang formally charged

The former all-powerful head of China's secret police, Zhou Yongkang, has been formally charged with "bribery, abuse of power and international disclosure of state secrets", paving the way for what promises to be one of the most electrifying trials in modern Chinese history.

The official Xinhua News Agency on Friday morning said that the indictment, which repeated charges outlined by Chinese Communist party investigators in December, had been filed by prosecutors in the Tianjin Intermediate People's Court.

Mr Zhou, a former member of the party's Politburo Standing Committee, is the biggest "tiger" of President Xi' Jingping's unprecedent two-year anti-corruption campaign.

The fearsome former head of China's internal security apparatus (including the courts, judiciary, police and secret police) is the most senior cadre to face formal corruption charges since the founding of the People's Republic in 1949.

Tianjin is a port city close to Beijing where Mr Zhou, who rose through the ranks of China's oil industry and later ran the southwestern province of Sichuan, has never served.

Senior party officials accused of wrongdoing are frequently tried in cities where they lack power bases and local court officials can be relied upon to do the party's bidding, which is conveyed through its powerful politics and law committees.

Mr Zhou was an ally of Bo Xilai, a former rival of Mr Xi. Bo was convicted in 2013 of corruption and other charges. He had previously served as commerce minister and head of northeastern Liaoning province and the southwestern city of Chongqing and was tried in eastern Shandong province.

Mr Zhou's detention as part of the party's "shuanggui" investigation process was first confirmed last summer. The investigation was completed - and Mr Zhou expelled from the party - by the end of the year, after which he was handed over to the court system for a formal trial.

Party investigators had also accused Mr Zhou of having numerous affairs - a breach of party discipline that was not repeated in Friday's court indictment, according to the two-line Xinhua dispatch.

Xinhua's description of the state secrets leak as "international" suggests that he will be charged with revealing classified information to overseas media organisations, people outside China or even foreign governments.

The court case could begin as early as next month. Starting with Bo's trial in 2013, the Chinese government has experimented with "live" broadcasts of high-profile corruption cases. At Mr Bo's trial, foreign and domestic journalists who travelled to Shandong were able to monitor a controlled Weibo feed in a separate location.

Similar arrangements were made last year for the trial of Liu Tienan, a former vice-minister at the National Development and Reform Commission.

Mr Zhou's trial will confirm Mr Xi's status as the country's most powerful ruler since Deng Xiaoping, the transformative post-Mao leader who launched the reform and opening programme that has made China the world's largest economy by some measures.

Since taking over the party in November 2012 and the presidency in March 2013, Mr Xi has consolidated power at a speed that has surprised his global peers and domestic rivals.

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