China’s military must learn from the glorious, uncorrupt example of its revolutionary forebears and thoroughly banish the deep-rooted, pernicious influence of the army’s worst corruption scandal in decades, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has told officers.
Xi, who heads the military, has made weeding out corruption in the armed forces a top goal. Several senior officers have been felled, including one of China’s most senior former military officers, Xu Caihou (徐才厚). Xu died of cancer in March.
Meeting soldiers in the northeastern city of Changchun, Xi said there can be no ambiguity when it comes to fighting graft.
“The damage caused by Xu Caihou’s discipline and law-breaching activities is all-encompassing and deep-rooted,” Xi said, according to a Chinese Ministry of National Defense statement late on Sunday.
Xu, who was a vice chairman of the powerful Central Military Commission which Xi leads, died before he could be brought to trial.
The government in October last year said Xu had confessed to taking “massive” bribes in exchange for help in promotions.
“Thoroughly clear away the influence of the Xu Caihou case in thinking, politics, organization and work style. Return to, hold on to and carry on the glorious traditions and excellent working style of the old Red Army,” Xi said, using an informal term for communist forces who in 1949 won the Chinese civil war.
His remarks were carried in all major state-run newspapers yesterday.
The Global Times, an influential tabloid published by the Chinese Communist Party’s official People’s Daily, said it was the first time Xi had mentioned Xu in public since the Xu’s death.
Retired and serving officers have warned that the graft problem in the army is so serious it could affect the military’s ability to wage war.
China intensified its crackdown on corruption in the military in the late 1990s, banning the Chinese People’s Liberation Army from engaging in business. However, the military has been involved in commercial dealings in recent years due to a lack of checks and balances, military analysts have said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing
RSS