China maintains silence on VP’s whereabouts

BEIJING: Chinese authorities and media remained silent on the whereabouts of Vice President Xi Jinping yesterday, with rumors and speculation spreading over why Beijing was not more forthcoming on the health of its president-in-waiting.
Xi has skipped meetings with a number of visiting leaders and senior officials over the past week, including US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, because of what sources told Reuters was a possible injury to his back suffered while swimming.
But Chinese officials have refused to give any explanation for Xi’s absence from the public stage, giving rise to bizarre speculation on the country’s Internet rumor mill. According to various theories being floated, the 59-year-old Xi has had a stroke or heart attack, was the target of an assassination attempt or was secreting himself, preparing for war.
Xi has not been seen in public since Sept. 1 and the continued unwillingness of the government to impart any information on the health or whereabouts of the man who is essentially China’s president-elect was beginning to cause unease overseas.
“Something serious must have happened, because they would have put him on national TV right away had there been no serious physical problem,” said Minxin Pei, professor of government at Claremont McKenna College in California.
“I rule out political foul play, that he is in some kind of serious political trouble. It’s simply unimaginable,” Pei said. “He gave a speech on Sept. 1, and that’s after Beidaihe — if he were in political trouble, he wouldn’t have given that speech.”
Beidaihe is the seaside summer retreat of senior Communist Party leaders, who meet there every August to hammer out policies for the coming year. This year the talks were likely to have focused on the new party leadership to be unveiled at the party congress expected to be held in October.
With the party’s congress held only once every five years and its top leaders being replaced only every decade, it is China’s most important political event. The fact that its timing has not yet been announced has fueled speculation about discord within the Communist Party.
n FROM: Reuters