by Zheng Chenguang

China's Zhejiang University has announced it would fire an associate professor involved in a pharmacology thesis fraud which was uncovered last October.

But questions still linger over whether the professor should come under judicial review as he also abused research funds, which were supposed to be used for producing these theses.

Insiders with China's National Natural Science foundation say that research often ends in vain, despite the huge cost of research funding.

So the public should let the professor go on this issue.

An article in the Beijing News argues that a tolerant academic environment should not be an alibi for research fund abuse.

In many foreign countries, academic fraud is strictly prohibited by law. China still lacks research funding on the whole. And such abuse is tantamount to adding salt to a gaping wound.

The article says relevant departments should work on two fronts to improve the situation. First of all, they should make the management of research funds more transparent and supervise the use of the funds thoroughly.

Secondly, an accountability system should be set up to clamp down on the abuse of funds.

It calls for a judicial review to be introduced to aid the process to bringing those responsible to justice.