China excuses its disappeared foreign minister… and returns his predecessor

He was absent for a month and did not appear, then his absence sparked many speculations and rumors.

However, Beijing decided to break its silence, and announced today, Tuesday, the dismissal of its Foreign Minister Chen Gang, who has not appeared in public for a month, from his post.

Things did not stop there, but rather re-appointed his predecessor, Wang Yi, as foreign minister, according to state media on Tuesday.

No information

And the new China news agency, Xinhua, reported that “Qin Gang was relieved of the position of foreign minister,” which he had held since December 2022, and Wang Yi, the current chief diplomat, was appointed instead of him, without specifying a reason for this change.

It is noteworthy that the White House had announced that it had no information about the reasons for the disappearance of the Chinese Foreign Minister, Chen Gang, from the public arena.

And the National Security Adviser to US President Jake Sullivan, in his response to a question about the fate of the Chinese minister, last Saturday, said: “We do not know. Literally, this is what we have so far from the information about him.”

Chinese Foreign Minister Chen Gang (AFP)

He stated that Chinese Foreign Minister Chen Gang was scheduled to meet his US counterpart, Anthony Blinken, within the framework of the Southeast Asian Ministers’ Forum (ASEAN) in Indonesia.

However, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced before the “ASEAN” summit that its minister, Chen Jang, will not attend the “ASEAN” meetings held in Indonesia for health reasons.

The ministry declined to comment on whether Jang’s health problems were caused by infection with the novel coronavirus.

Last activity last month

It is noteworthy that the chief Chinese diplomat, Wang Yi, was present instead of Chen Gang, who was the Chinese foreign minister before him.

According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s website, Chen’s last recorded activity was on June 25, when he met with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Andrei Rudenko in Beijing to discuss Sino-Russian relations.