Both are believed to have been personally selected for their roles by President Xi Jinping.
BEIJING: China today removed defence minister Li Shangfu and ousted former foreign minister Qin Gang from its cabinet, state media reported, as part of a major reshuffle of its top leadership.
Today state broadcaster CCTV announced the removals in its regular evening bulletin, but did not give reasons for the ministers’ fall from grace.Previously it had been reported that the US government believed Li was under investigation and had been stripped of his ministerial duties, but China had refused to comment on the matter.Two days later, the government of Belarus released handout photographs of Li meeting with Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko in Minsk.
He was replaced by Wang Yi, a veteran diplomat who served as foreign minister before Qin and who outranked him in the Chinese government hierarchy.The downfall of Qin and Li “is not flattering for leadership because the removals suggest he picked the wrong guys”, Yun Sun, senior fellow and director of the China Program at the Stimson Center in Washington, told AFP.
That opacity was also evident when China announced recently a new leadership for its Rocket Force, the army unit that oversees its nuclear arsenal, as media reported a corruption probe involving its former chief.