China foreign minister goes missing, rumors of his affair with journalist spread

China foreign minister goes missing, rumors of his affair with journalist spread
China: Rumours about China’s foreign minister Qin, who has been missing, have fueled intense speculations – including an alleged extramarital affair with a journalist.

Officially, China has explained Qin’s disappearance as a health-related matter. But no pictures of him recovering from alleged illness or undergoing treatment have emerged, which has fuelled rumours. Qin was supposed to attend the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meeting in Jakarta but instead, the foreign ministry announced that Director of Foreign Affairs Commission Wang Yi would fill his shoes.

Qin’s last public appearance was during a meeting with Russia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Rudenko Andrey Yurevich on 25 June.

Qin, as per the rumour mill, had an affair with a TV show host named Fu Xiaotian affiliated with Hong Kong-based Phoenix TV. And that he had a child out of wedlock with Fu, who is a US citizen.

There is a lack of clarity about who Fu’s husband is, which has added to the speculation about Qin being her child’s father.

Overseas Chinese media, including Mandarin language media based in Taiwan, have also intensely speculated about Qin’s alleged affair. They shared videos of Fu’s interview with Qin wherein they appear to be smiling while looking away at the horizon. Fu’s last tweet is seen as another piece of evidence. She posted three photos, including one where she is interviewing Qin. She hasn’t tweeted or posted on Weibo since 11 April.

If the rumours about Qin’s affair are true, Chinese President Xi Jinping has a difficult task ahead of him. Xi promoted Qin to the role of foreign minister over other senior diplomats because of their shared ties. Infidelity rumours would be challenging to hush away as Xi has made it a point to promote cadres with a good track record. Qin’s example would poke a hole in that façade.

The other possibility is that both rumours about Qin’s ill health and the affair are true, which means Xi could slowly use the former to sideline one of his close confidants. Alternatively, all rumours are a bit of fluff, and Qin is not keeping well.

We will know about his fate in the coming weeks.

Interestingly, the Ministry of Public Security of China has launched a new campaign to inform the public about misinformation and build a solid ‘national security barrier’.

“Persist in building a solid national network security barrier, persist in giving play to the driving and leading role of informatization, persist in managing the network according to the law,” said Xi during a two-day meeting on cybersecurity.

Since Qin was missing from action, India’s Minister of External Affairs S. Jaishankar met with Wang Yi on the sidelines of the ASEAN meeting in Jakarta.

During the meeting, Wang said India should meet ‘China halfway’ on the border issue, a well-honed Chinese talking point.

“Both sides should be mutually supportive and fulfilling, not mutually consuming and be suspicious of each other,” Wang told Jaishankar.

But a new topic was also addressed between Wang and Jaishankar.

The Chinese official raised concerns about ‘India’s recent restrictive measures against Chinese companies’ alluding to some recent actions against Xiaomi and others.

Xiaomi is facing charges of Foreign Exchange Management Act 1999 (FEMA) violations triggered by alleged funds transfer from India to Europe.

New Delhi’s targeted campaign against Chinese companies operating in India is starting to resemble what the US has been doing for the past three years. The actions against Chinese companies are Beijing’s own making.