He Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, who had been out of the public eye for a month, was fired on Tuesday and relieved by his predecessor in office, Wang Yi.
Qin had not appeared in public since June 25, the day he met in the Chinese capital with officials from Sri Lanka, Russia and Vietnam, and since then, has been absent from various diplomatic events, awakening all kinds of speculation about his whereabouts and his situation.
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Assembly (ANP, Legislative) approved on Tuesday in an unusual meeting the dismissal of Qin and the return of Wang Yi as chancellor, according to the state agency Xinhua in a brief statement.
The country’s President and General Secretary of the Communist Party, Xi Jinping, signed an order to make the decision effective, the agency added.
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Qin’s removal follows his breakneck rise last December, when his firm and aggressive tone was awarded the chancellorship of the country, beginning months of frenetic activity with the opening of the country after the end of the ‘zero covid’ policy.
Qin then replaced Wang Yi with an international agenda marked by the War in Ukraine or the growing rivalry with Washington.
But his last high-profile public appearance took place last June, when he met in Beijing with the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, at a time when both parties were trying to recover communication to avoid further conflict.
Qin had planned to attend the last ASEAN summit held in Indonesia, which, according to Beijing, he missed “for health reasons.”
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Nor did the US Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, participate in the meetings held in Beijing. and the White House Special Envoy for Climate Change, John Kerry, who was received by Wang Yi.
Now, Qing Gang he becomes the shortest foreign minister in his country’s history.
Rumors about Qin’s departure
According to international media such as ABC, Beijing has remained silent about the whereabouts or status of the now former Foreign Minister and, in fact, it has eliminated the questions of journalists in the official transcripts of the press conferences.
“We have no information available,” says ABC about the response received from Beijing.
The aforementioned newspaper also mentions that the accounts that Qin was away for health reasons have lost weight. On the contrary, the rumors that ensure that the former chancellor had an extramarital relationship with a presenter. That rumor, says the aforementioned newspaper, cost him his job.
“Qin would be being punished for having had an extramarital relationship with a Phoenix TV presenter named Fu Xiaotian,” ABC reports.
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ABC reported that the presenter published a photograph with her son that, they say, would be of the former minister. “According to these interpretations, Qin would have paid with her career for the lack of discretion of his supposed lover,” says the cited media.
For now, these are just rumors.
The truth is Wang -69 years old- returns to the position that he already held from 2013 until last December 31 after replacing Qin in several of the meetings that were held during the last month.
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“China wants to avoid the embarrassment of Wang Yi continually appearing at foreign minister-level meetings without having an appropriate title,” said Wen-ti Sung, a non-resident member of the Global China Hub.
Wang Yi is part of the Politburo (the leadership of the formation, made up of 24 people), and was promoted last October to head of the Office of the Party’s Foreign Affairs Commission, which made him the highest-ranking diplomat in China.
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