The strange disappearance of Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang has become a major embarrassment for the regime in Beijing, as speculation grows that he has been silenced and purged for political reasons or personal misbehavior.
Daniel R. Russel, a former senior U.S. diplomat who now works for the Asia Society Policy Institute, told the far-left New York Times (NYT) on Monday that Qin’s disappearance is “embarrassing and unsettling to Chinese diplomats because of the uncertainty it injects in a system that is tightly controlled.”
“For foreign diplomats it raises even more questions about the bureaucratic weight of China’s foreign ministry,” Russel added.
“Secrecy is the chosen mode of operation because for the Chinese Communist Party, information is a weapon, but in this case, the mystery surrounding such an important official — foreign minister — is mind-boggling,” marveled Jamestown Foundation senior fellow Willy Wo-Lap Lam.
Qin’s abrupt disappearance follows a swift rise through the Chinese bureaucracy. He began as a diplomatic staffer in 1988, became an embassy official and Foreign Ministry spokesman by 2010, took over as director of the protocol department in 2014, and was appointed vice minister of Foreign Affairs in 2018.
Qin worked personally with dictator Xi Jinping while running the protocol department, a close relationship that paved the way for his last two leaps up the career ladder: ambassador to the United States in July 2021 and promotion to foreign minister in December 2022.
Qin is only 57, which is relatively young for such a high-ranking Chinese official. His predecessor, Wang Yi, was 69 when Qin took over. It took Wang 12 years to advance from vice foreign minister to foreign minister; Qin did it in four.
Qin was seen as one of the first “Wolf Warrior” diplomats – aggressive hyper-nationalists who patterned their brash style after a series of Chinese action movies – but after he became ambassador to the United States, he mellowed considerably, becoming a public advocate for improving relations with Washington.
Qin was last seen in public on June 25 at a meeting with representatives from Russia, Vietnam, and Sri Lanka. The clock on his disappearance really started ticking on July 5, when China canceled a scheduled visit from the European Union’s high representative for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell.
Borrell was supposed to hold an annual meeting with the Chinese foreign minister that was already delayed once from April, when Borrell tested positive for the Wuhan coronavirus. The E.U. was told the rescheduled July meeting had to be canceled for unspecified reasons, even though such urgent topics as the Russian invasion of Ukraine were on the agenda.
“We welcome High Level Representative Borrell to visit China at the earliest time convenient to both sides,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said, without explaining why July was suddenly inconvenient.
Some observers speculated China canceled the Borrell meeting in a fit of pique over export restrictions with the United States or to clear the calendar for Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s visit to Beijing – a trip with modest expectations that wound up producing little of substance.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang, right, shakes hands with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, left, during a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, Friday, July 7, 2023 (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, Pool).
Qin missed every other event scheduled after June 25, including an important meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on July 11, at which China was an invited guest. After Qin was replaced by another diplomat at the ASEAN gathering in Indonesia, the Chinese government made its first public comment about his status.
“State Councillor and Foreign Minister Qin Gang cannot attend this ASEAN ministerial meeting because of health reasons,” said Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Wenbin, without explaining what those health concerns might be.
Foreign media found this comment curious because only a few days earlier, a journalist asked about rumors of Qin’s poor health, and Wang replied he had heard of no such reports. Other Foreign Ministry representatives have flatly refused to answer questions about Qin.
When the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) asked about his status on Wednesday, the Foreign Ministry’s response was a one-sentence email: “China’s diplomatic activities are steadily advancing.”
Qin’s attendance has been canceled for at least one more scheduled event, and the British government is frustrated because it has been unable to book an important meeting between Qin and his opposite number in the U.K., Foreign Secretary James Cleverly.
Chinese Internet users are grumbling about Qin’s embarrassing disappearance and the reluctance of government officials to make any firm statements about his condition. Chinese search engines report a huge surge of interest in the missing foreign minister.
“Does she not know how to respond?” a commenter on China’s heavily censored microblogging platform Weibo asked when Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning insisted she had no information about her boss on Monday.
Ian Chong of the National University of Singapore told the BBC on Tuesday that the freedom of Chinese social media users to speculate on Qin’s fate, and even float some ideas about his replacement, without getting silenced by China’s vast army of speech police is a bad sign for Qin.
“The absence of censorship make people wonder if there is any truth to rumors about power struggles, corruption, the abuse of power and positions, and romantic relationships,” Chong observed.
Curiously, one thing that has been censored is the claim made by Chinese officials that Qin is dealing with health issues. Reuters noticed on Thursday that comments about Qin’s health made only a few days ago have been scrubbed from official transcripts of Chinese Foreign Ministry press briefings, and comments have been disabled on blog posts mentioning him.
Channel News Asia (CNA) on Thursday cited “unsubstantiated reports” that “Qin’s absence is linked to an alleged affair with a journalist, with whom he is said to have a child out of wedlock.”
The journalist in question is Fu Xiaotian, a Chinese-born, Cambridge-educated, Hong Kong-based television host and producer. Fu gave birth last November, then wrote an enigmatic Weibo post on March 19 wishing the unnamed father of her child a happy birthday. Qin Gang was born on March 19, 1966.
The Times of London on Monday found Chinese Internet users passing around clips of Fu interviewing Qin last year and speculating on the nature of their relationship:
On Twitter, one Chinese user shared a video clip from an interview by Fu with Qin dated March 24 last year, when he was in Washington. In the video, Qin shares his views about the history of the US, but the user focused on what he described as the “affectionate flirting” between them. He pointed out that Fu often adopted a flirtatious air during interviews. “But when she turns her attention to a high-ranking Chinese official, she may have violated the Chinese Ministry of State Security’s regulations,” he said.
Lin Shengliang, a Chinese human rights activist, pointed out that Qin became ambassador to the US in 2021 and the interview with Fu took place in March last year. Fu gave birth to her son in November. When Qin was promoted to state councillor rank in March, Fu is believed to have shared a picture of her son on the Chinese social media platform Weibo with the comment “a victorious opening”, leading some to speculate that she was congratulating Qin.
“While adultery is not a crime in China, the Chinese Communist Party’s rules prohibit its members from ‘having improper sexual relationships with others,’” CNA noted, suggesting the rumored affair might be enough to bring Qin down because he is close to Xi Jinping but not quite powerful enough to have his prominent mistress dragged off to a reeducation camp, as many believe happened to tennis star Peng Shuai after she accused a powerful Politburo member of sexually assaulting her.
“If he tries to protect Qin, Xi would lose his credibility as a leader of integrity. If he dismisses Qin, he would lose his credibility as a leader who protects his loyal subordinates,” CNA ventured.
Fu has also vanished from public view. According to the Times of London, her last known social media post included three photos: “a luxury jet, a screenshot of her interview with Qin, and a selfie of herself and her son.”