As Xi Jinping seeks to secure a fourth leadership term, he has officially expelled 33 senior political and military officials from the Communist Party of China. This action includes a prominent former diplomat and one of his military secretaries.
Anti-Corruption Campaign and Loyalty to the Party
This announcement clarifies the dimensions of Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaigns; campaigns that continue as he prepares for his fourth leadership term next year. The Communist Party of China has emphasized that these expulsions were previously approved by the Party's Political Bureau, and the Central Committee confirmed these decisions at the end of its four-day meeting in Beijing.
Fate of Missing Officials
The Central Committee's statement also clarified the fate of some officials who had been missing for months. Among these individuals is Liu Jianchao, a senior official in China's foreign policy, who headed the International Communication Department of the Communist Party until his resignation last year. Also included is Zhong Shaojun, one of Xi Jinping's senior secretaries who had acted as his eyes and ears in the Central Military Commission.
Wen-Shuan Tsai, a researcher at Academia Sinica in Taiwan, described this meeting as a sign of a widespread purge of officials that Xi Jinping himself appointed to various positions since coming to power in 2012. He added that the empty seats at the Central Committee meeting indicate the scale of these changes; only 279 officials attended this meeting, while the current Central Committee had 376 members when it was formed at the Communist Party Congress in 2022.
Given these statistics, it appears that nearly 100 members of the Central Committee have been sidelined over the past four years. Tsai described this development as the largest purge in the history of the Communist Party of China.
The Communist Party also confirmed that its next congress will be held in the second half of 2027, at which Xi Jinping is likely to be elected for a fourth five-year term as General Secretary of the Party.
