BEIJING: Photos and references to the 57-year-old former foreign minister Qin Gang began to disappear from the ministry’s website hours after China’s top legislature convened a special meeting last week to remove him.

Some of this material resurfaced on the site a few days later, but Qin is still not included in the directory of “former ministers,” and a search for his name still returns the message “Sorry, Qin Gang is not found” several days after that.
In fact, it’s been almost a month since anyone has seen him.
There has been much speculation about his fate and how this whole saga reflects on the man who supported his meteoric rise, President Xi Jinping, despite the foreign ministry’s brief explanation weeks ago that this was due to health reasons, a remark later excised from official transcripts.
China has replaced Qin with seasoned diplomat Wang Yi, but has provided little details about the decision.
On Thursday, Mao Ning, a spokesperson for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, stated that Beijing will provide information about Qin promptly and that China is opposed to “malicious hype.”
One of more than twenty-five questions regarding Qin at press conferences in recent days, she was responding to a reporter who had inquired about transparency surrounding Qin’s departure.
The Winds of Speculation
There was no quick response to requests for comment on this story from the Chinese Foreign Ministry or the State Council Information Office, which responds to media enquiries on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party and government.
Speculation will persist due to Qin’s prolonged absence without explanation, his abruptly cut-short tenure, and other odd occurrences, such as the ministry’s website.
According to Ian Johnson, senior fellow for China studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, “the truth will eventually come out – it usually does in China, although it sometimes takes months or years,” but the manner in which he was dismissed suggests it was not for health reasons.
A political analyst in Beijing named Wu Qiang claimed he could “almost certainly rule out health as the real reason.” According to Wu, the state could have just as easily replaced him with a constable if such was the case.
Qin, one of the country’s youngest foreign ministers, served for only half his five-year term (beginning in December 2022).
There have been prior cases of Chinese politicians being forgotten about and erased from history.
Last year, Xiao Yaqing, the minister of industry, disappeared for about a month before it was disclosed that he was the subject of a corruption investigation.
After Zhang Kunsheng, the foreign ministry’s former chief protocol officer, was convicted of corruption and abusing his position for sexual gain in 2016, the government scrubbed the internet clean of all mention of him.
In China, history-erasing practises date back decades.
Between 1955 and 1972, the government retouched a painting three times to remove officials who had fallen out of favour with Mao Zedong after he had stood atop Tiananmen Gate to announce the creation of the people’s republic.
“Politics of One”
But other analysts have pointed out that Qin’s case isn’t so black and white.
Despite having the authority to do so, experts say that the National People’s Congress Standing Committee that met on Tuesday did not strip Qin of his second title of State Councillor.
Even though the former U.S. envoy was removed off the foreign ministry’s website, a Reuters witness said on Thursday that a portrait of him still hung prominently in the Chinese embassy in Washington.
Experts also note that Qin would have been subjected to extensive screening in order to take on the post only a few short months ago.
Leaders in the Communist Party are required to divulge personal information, like the number of members in their family, where they have lived, and how much money they have, as part of the vetting process.
Analysts claim that Xi’s efforts to curb corruption since assuming power in 2012 have strengthened members’ devotion to him because they have resulted in stricter measures to combat corruption and enforce party discipline.
Qin’s spectacular rise in the ranks has been partly ascribed to his proximity to the president, so if his removal is for more than just health, the stakes get higher for Xi.
During Xi’s first term in office, Qin served as top protocol officer, a position that afforded him front-row seats to all of Xi’s meetings with foreign heads of state.
In just five years, which is the pace of a fast train in China, he went from director of protocol to U.S. ambassador to foreign minister to state councillor.
Analysts agree that Xi’s final leadership lineup for his unprecedented third term in office, disclosed early this year, was comprised largely of people with whom he had previously worked and trusted.
Xi abandoned the norm of having serving and former party officials cast ballots on prospective candidates before producing a list for broader party delegates to ratify.
According to state media Xinhua, the names were instead determined under Xi’s “direct leadership” after he visited with contenders and talked with others.
Associate professor at Singapore’s Lee Kwan Yew School of Public Policy Alfred Wu commented, “This Qin saga exposes the vulnerability of Xi’s one-man politics.”