About 14.21 percent of 1.05 million convicts in criminal cases last year received severer penalties than five-years imprisonment, according to a report on China's legal system development released Tuesday.

The number included the convicts sentenced to life imprisonment and death, said the report issued by the China Law Society annually. But it did not give the exact number of people sentenced to death.

Last year, courts at all levels closed about 11.49 million cases, including 840,000 criminal ones, the report said.

Criminal cases related to food safety received a higher priority in court last year while corruption cases remained a top priority, the report said.

A total of 278 cases of producing and distributing poisonous and harmful foods and more than 27,000 corruption cases were closed last year, according to the report.

Prosecutors also worked hard on corruption cases. They investigated about 44,000 suspects in 32,567 graft cases last year, the report said.

Among the suspects involved in bribery, 2,524 were officials holding higher positions than county heads, including seven at the minister or governor level.

In addition, 10,585 officials were investigated for breach of duty, a year-on-year increase of 3.5 percent, the report said.

More bribers stood trial last year. The number of bribers taken to court increased by 6.2 percent to 4,217 in 2011 from that of 2010, according to the report.

Also, 1,631 wanted suspects in corruption cases were captured and arrested last year.