It’s been over six weeks since former Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang disappeared and over two weeks since he was unceremoniously removed from his post amid rumors of corruption, an extra-marital affair, and an investigation.
While Mr. Qin has been replaced by his predecessor, Wang Yi, his continued disappearance has stoked discussion on how this state of affairs will impact China’s foreign policy.
Experts told The Epoch Times that Mr. Qin’s disappearance is related to infighting between Chinese Communist Party (CCP) foreign policy cliques. It also indicates that China’s foreign policy will continue to be pro-Russia and anti-United States.
“There are two factions within the CCP when it comes to foreign policy. The pro-U.S. faction vs. pro-Russia faction. Qin is said to be of the pro-U.S. faction,” Nicole Tsai, a spokeswoman for the New Federal State of China, a New York-based pro-democracy group, told The Epoch Times in an email.
China’s state policies are largely shrouded in secrecy, and experts have increasingly understood that factional politics contribute to power politics in Beijing and are a progenitor of matters of foreign policy and national security.
“The replacement of Qin by his predecessor Wang Yi, known for his ‘wolf warrior diplomacy,’ suggests [that the] CCP’s foreign policy will be more inclined to [be] anti-U.S. and pro-Russia,” Ms. Tsai said.
Functionally, the CCP is a complex body with infighting among its members, according to the authors, who wrote, “This competition can be vicious,” and “foreign affairs are not immune to this infighting.”
He Qinglian, a prominent U.S.-based China economics expert and commentator, told The Epoch Times that it’s not surprising there are internal struggles within China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“Where there are people, there are conflicts,” Ms. He said.
The China expert referred to a 1966 quote by former CCP leader Mao Zedong in which he said, “You may say that there are no factions in our party, but there are.”
Ms. He said, ”By allowing the party to be divided into two factions, Mao acted as a balancer between the two sides, giving him the ability to consolidate his power.”
The diplomatic relations between China and the United States started more than half a century earlier, and the CCP’s “big country diplomacy” is actually Beijing’s relationship with Washington, according to Ms. He. This means a pro-U.S. clique has long been formed within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
On the other hand, China has once again focussed on diplomacy with Russia since 2009, and Russian diplomats are naturally growing in popularity within the ministry, she said.
Within the CCP’s single-party, totalitarian system of governance, the issue of which clique is in charge at the ministry determines many things, including the fates of China’s burgeoning number of civil servants and diplomats.
“It can be said that among the two factions in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, whichever faction has the upper hand will have more opportunities for promotion,” said Ms. He.
Pro-US Versus Pro-Russia
Ms. He drew attention to what unfolded between the pro-U.S. and pro-Russia cliques within the CCP’s foreign ministry before the disappearance of Mr. Qin and his removal as the head of the ministry.The expert said that three days after Mr. Qin’s dismissal, the then-deputy director of the State Administration of Radio and Television, Le Yucheng, was also dismissed on July 20. Mr. Le is a former deputy foreign minister and, according to Ms. He, was once considered a popular candidate for foreign minister.
Mr. Le, 60, joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1986 and was transferred to Russia as the Chinese ambassador in 2019 when he was deputy minister of foreign affairs.
“His working experience was mainly in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. In 2017, Le Yucheng was promoted [as] an alternate member of the 19th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,” Ms. He said.
Mr. Le was transferred from Russia just four months after the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on June 14, 2022, because he failed to inform Mr. Xi about the onset of the war, according to the China expert.
“Judging from Le Yucheng’s words, deeds, and interests, he is [part of the] pro-Russian faction,” said Ms. He, adding that after the Russia-Ukraine war began, the relationship between China and the United States came under additional strain.
Amid this increased tension between Beijing and Washington, Mr. Qin was appointed as China’s foreign minister on Dec. 30, 2022. At the time, he replaced the then-minister Wang Yi. Ms. He said it was generally believed that by appointing Mr. Qin, Mr. Xi was trying to improve U.S.-China ties.
“Since then, Qin Gang’s most notable move was when the United Nations made a ‘full vote’ on the draft resolution A/77/L.65 in late April, which clearly mentioned that ‘the Russian Federation invaded Ukraine after it invaded Georgia,’” said Ms. He.
China was one of the 122 countries that voted in favor, while five countries voted against it, and 18 countries abstained.
“This is the only time that China voted in favor of the United Nations’ many votes to condemn Russia after the start of the Russo-Ukraine War,” said Ms. He, adding that despite this vote, China didn’t receive what it wanted from the United States.
“There was still no sign of the abolition of tariffs,” she said, adding that U.S. President Joe Biden on June 21 even called Mr. Xi a “dictator,” making it clear that the “olive branch” extended by China to the United States had been rejected.
Meanwhile, the interaction between China and Russia was temporarily suspended from late April until Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin visited China on May 24. Since then, Russian-Chinese relations have been on an upswing, according to Ms. He.
Qin’s Diplomats
Meanwhile, during the few months that Mr. Qin was foreign minister, the diplomats belonging to the pro-U.S. clique in the foreign ministry kept giving statements in favor of Ukraine and against Russia, which created trouble for Mr. Qin.The Chinese ambassador to France, Lu Shaye, sparked outrage in Europe during a televised interview in April when he said that former Soviet nations don’t have an “effective status in international law.” Mr. Lu said this in reply to a question on whether Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, was part of Ukraine.
In response, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia summoned their respective Chinese representatives for clarification. The Chinese Embassy in France later had to clarify and say that Mr. Lu’s comments were “not a statement of policy, but an expression of personal views.”
Contradicting this, Fu Cong, the Chinese ambassador to the European Union, said in an interview with Al Jazeera that he supports Ukraine regaining its territorial border of 1991, which means gaining back the territories occupied by Russia. Mr. Fu had given similar statements earlier in an April interview with The New York Times when he said China doesn’t support Russian annexation of Ukrainian territories.
“This kind of contradicting diplomatic position at least shows that Qin Gang, the foreign minister, had failed to lead,” said Mr. He, adding that this was his “sore foot.”
Meanwhile, though Mr. Le was no longer a part of the foreign ministry, his pro-Russia clique still exists, and, therefore, Mr. Xi removed Mr. Qin to remain on top of the situation, experts believe.
Nishakant Ojha, a New Delhi-based China expert, made reference to how intelligence experts look at such affairs in China.
“It is an old chapter taught in intelligence that when the checks and balances in the system are gone, it will force China to depend entirely on one person’s decision, and there could be a lot of ‘surprises’ that might eventually rattle the system,” said Mr. Ojha.
Impact on China’s Foreign Policy
Experts said that Mr. Qin’s removal would have a detrimental impact on China’s foreign policy.Joel Atkinson, an expert in East Asian affairs at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in South Korea, told The Epoch Times that the world is closely watching China and studying the arbitrariness of Beijing’s messages.
“It increases perceptions that decision-making in Beijing is opaque and unpredictable, adding to the sense of risk that is fueling efforts to de-risk the relationship with China,” he said.
Frank Lehberger, a German-based China expert, said that Mr. Qin was probably the only high-ranking official in the Chinese foreign ministry who was an expert on Washington and trusted by Mr. Xi.
“So, his demotion is a loss for both Chinese foreign policy and for Xi’s foreign policy intentions,” Mr. Lehberger told The Epoch Times in an email.
The current foreign minister, Wang Yi, according to Mr. Lehberger, is an expert on Japan and not on the United States; thus, China will lose valuable insights into Washington. By reassigning Mr. Wang as foreign minister, Mr. Xi has actually demoted him to a lower level of power and, therefore, it’s a nuisance for Mr. Wang, he said. Mr. Wang is the CCP’s highest-ranking diplomat as head of the Foreign Affairs Commission, the regime’s top foreign policy decision-making body.
“There is simply no one else in the Chinese foreign ministry who has that level of expertise and experience right now that Qin Gang had accumulated over time,” he said.
When Mr. Wang was foreign minister, his knowledge deficit did not matter, according to Mr. Lehberger, because the then-chief of the CCP Foreign Affairs Committee was Yang Jiechi.
“Yang, who is now honorably retired, had once been the personal interpreter of the Bush family,” wrote Mr. Lehberger, adding that Mr. Yang had become an expert on the who-is-who in Washington since that time. Yang accompanied George H. W. Bush and his family as an interpreter during the future president’s trip to China in the late 1970s. The Bush family reportedly was fond of Yang and gave him the nickname “Tiger Yang.”
The expert believes Mr. Wang and Mr. Yang don’t trust each other, and Mr. Wang wouldn’t want to recall Mr. Yang from retirement.
“Xi also does not trust Yang for political reasons,” Mr. Lehberger said.
