World

Former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin, who steered the country through a transformational era from the late 1980s and into the new millennium, died Wednesday at the age of 96, state news agency Xinhua said.

Jiang took power in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and led the world’s most populous nation towards its emergence as a powerhouse on the global stage.

“Jiang Zemin passed away due to leukemia and multiple organ failure in Shanghai at 12:13 p.m. on Nov. 30, 2022, at the age of 96, it was announced on Wednesday,” Xinhua reported.

Xinhua said the announcement of his death was made in a letter expressing “profound grief” at Jiang’s death, addressed to the whole Communist Party, military and Chinese people. 

His death came after all medical treatments had failed, it said.

“Comrade Jiang Zemin was an outstanding leader… a great Marxist, a great proletarian revolutionary, statesman, military strategist and diplomat, a long-tested communist fighter, and an outstanding leader of the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics,” Xinhua quoted the letter as saying. 

Jiang’s death comes as China sees a flare-up of anti-lockdown protests that have morphed into calls for wider political freedoms — the most widespread since the 1989 pro-democracy rallies that were crushed the year Jiang took power. 

“During the serious political turmoil in China in the spring and summer of 1989, Comrade Jiang Zemin supported and implemented the correct decision of the Party Central Committee to oppose unrest, defend the socialist state power and safeguard the fundamental interests of the people,” state broadcaster CCTV said on Wednesday. 

State broadcaster CCTV said flags would be flown at half-mast at Chinese government buildings. 

When Jiang replaced Deng Xiaoping as leader in 1989, China was still in the early stages of economic modernisation.

By the time he retired as president in 2003, China was a member of the World Trade Organization, Beijing had secured the 2008 Olympics, and the country was well on its way to superpower status.

Analysts say Jiang and his “Shanghai Gang” faction continued to exert influence over communist politics long after he left the top job. 

In the immediate aftermath of the announcement, Chinese state media all posted the same black-and-white photo of a chrysanthemum on their official accounts on social media platform Weibo. 

Jiang’s entry on Baidu Encyclopedia, a Chinese site similar to Wikipedia, also turned black-and-white. 

Jiang is survived by his wife Wang Yeping and two sons.

Jiang Zemin led China through an era of stunning transformation after coming to power in the traumatic aftermath of the Tiananmen Square crackdown.

He died Wednesday at the age of 96, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Jiang rose from a factory engineer to leader of the world’s most populous country, steering China towards its emergence as the global trade, military, and political power that it is today.

When he took office in 1989, China was still in the cautious early stages of economic modernisation and an international pariah over the crushing of the Tiananmen pro-democracy movement.

But by the time Jiang retired as president in 2003, China was a member of the World Trade Organization, Britain had handed over Hong Kong, Beijing had secured the 2008 Olympics, and the country was well on its way to superpower status.

Analysts say Jiang and his “Shanghai Gang” faction continued to exert influence over communist politics, including in the selection of Xi Jinping as president in 2012.

However his power was believed to have waned as Xi’s influence grew.

Xi has become China’s most powerful political figure since Mao Zedong, recently securing a norm-breaking third term as Communist Party leader.

An electrical engineer by training who spent his early career in factories, Jiang lacked the revolutionary credentials and prestige of his predecessor, Deng Xiaoping, who tapped him to head a new generation of leaders.

Viewed by many as a transitional figure, Jiang was politically hamstrung in the Tiananmen aftermath.

But after Deng’s tour of booming southern provinces in 1992, Jiang proved an eager champion of his patron’s “reform and opening up” to lift China’s people from poverty.

“Without addressing the problem of (economic survival) first, it would be difficult to achieve any other right,” Jiang said in 1997.

State control over the economy was further dismantled by his premier Zhu Rongji, and foreign ties — particularly with the United States — improved significantly.

“It takes two hands to clap,” Jiang said in 2001 of Sino-US ties.

– Quirky image –

Jiang was the leader of the so-called “third generation” of Chinese communist leaders, a more technocratic and professional ruling elite following the early revolutionaries.

To foreign eyes, the generational shift was huge. 

Jiang smashed the stereotype of the stiff communist leader — with his wide grin, oversized spectacles, grasp of several languages, and sometimes clownish behaviour — including making jokes in English.

A music lover who played the piano, Jiang was known for bursting into song on foreign trips, including a memorable rendition of Elvis Presley’s “Love Me Tender” during a state visit to the Philippines.

Yet his legacy as leader remains mixed and his critics numerous.

Jiang was criticised for failing to solve new problems created by China’s economic rebirth: rampant corruption and inequality, environmental degradation and state sector reforms which caused mass layoffs.

Rights campaigners deplored his repression of political activists and the Falun Gong spiritual sect. He was resented by many as a bland technocrat who vainly tried to equate his own legacy with those of Mao and Deng.

Shrugging off foreign criticism over China’s human rights record, Jiang once equated democratic development to Einstein’s “Theory of Relativity”, insisting the country would move at its own pace.

Others, however, felt he was too solicitous towards the West.

Nepotism in the top ranks also became a sore point. His own sons were accused of using their names to get ahead, with Jiang Mianheng widely believed to have controlled major companies, and Jiang Miankang reportedly a top army general.

– Military chief –

A native of eastern Jiangsu province, Jiang was born into a relatively wealthy family in 1926 and raised under the Japanese wartime occupation.

Dabbling in underground student movements, he joined the Communist Party in 1946, before training as an engineer in Moscow and later distinguishing himself in state-owned industry.

With the help of powerful patrons, Jiang became Shanghai mayor in 1985 and later its Communist Party chief, putting him in the party’s national inner circle.

In 1989, during a major rift at the top over Tiananmen’s handling and China’s economic course, Deng tapped the non-controversial Jiang over other higher-ranking candidates to govern the party, while Deng remained paramount leader.

Jiang had been praised for peacefully ending Tiananmen-inspired protests in Shanghai, and amassed other important titles including military chief.

– ‘Toad worshippers’ –

Jiang was succeeded by Hu Jintao in 2002, but he clung onto the vestiges of power until 2004, when he finally gave up his title as head of China’s military.

His behind-the-scenes influence overshadowed Hu’s presidency, limiting his power to make bold political reforms. 

In recent years, Jiang had become an unlikely viral meme among millennial and Gen Z Chinese fans, who called themselves “toad worshippers” in thrall to his frog-like countenance and quirky mannerisms. 

During a marathon three-hour speech given by Xi at the 2017 Communist Party Congress, internet users delighted when Jiang visibly dozed off and checked his watch multiple times, or inspected documents with an oversized magnifying glass.

Jiang did not attend the opening or closing ceremonies of last month’s Party Congress — where Xi was appointed for a third term as party leader — sparking concerns over possible ill health.

Jiang is survived by his wife, Wang Yeping, and two sons.

Half the world’s democratic countries are experiencing an erosion of democracy, intensified by war in Ukraine and economic crisis, an international think tank said in a report on Wednesday.

“We’re seeing extraordinarily severe headwinds for democracy now, intensified by the political fallout from the economic crisis that started with the pandemic and the economic consequences of the war in Ukraine”, International IDEA secretary-general Kevin Casas-Zamora told AFP.

“It might be that the credibility of elections is challenged. It might be that the rule of law is under assault. It might be that civic space is being constrained”, he explained.

The number of democracies with the most severe democratic erosion — a group dubbed “backsliding” countries which has included the United States since last year — increased from six to seven in 2022 with the addition of El Salvador to the list.

The others are Brazil, Hungary, India, Mauritius and Poland.

Casas-Zamora singled out the US as particularly worrying.

“I’m very concerned by what we’re seeing in the United States”, he said.

The country faces political polarisation, institutional dysfunction and threats to civil liberties, according to the report.

“It’s quite clear by now that the fever didn’t break with the election of a new administration,” he said, pointing to “the runaway levels of polarisation (and) the attempts to undermine the credibility of electoral results without any evidence of fraud”.

Casas-Zamora noted the US had also taken a “visible step backwards” in sexual and reproductive rights, “which is very exceptional because most countries, pretty much all other countries, are going forward in terms of expanding sexual and reproductive rights”.

“The US is moving backwards”, he said.

– More authoritarianism –

Of the 173 countries covered by International IDEA’s report, 104 were democracies and 52 of those were in decline.

Meanwhile, the number of countries moving toward authoritarianism, 27, was more than double the number moving toward democracy, at 13.

Almost half of all authoritarian regimes became even more repressive in 2022, with Afghanistan, Belarus, Cambodia, Comoros and Nicaragua singled out as experiencing a “broad decline”.

In Asia, where only 54 percent of people live in a democracy, authoritarianism is solidifying, the report said, while Africa, despite a myriad of challenges, remains “resilient” in the face of instability.

A decade after the Arab Spring, the Middle East continues to be “the most authoritarian region in the world”. It has only three democracies — Iraq, Israel and Lebanon.

In Europe, almost half of all democracies, or 17 countries, suffered democratic erosion in the last five years.

“Democracies are struggling to effectively bring balance to environments marked by instability and anxiety, and populists continue to gain ground around the world as democratic innovation and growth stagnate or decline”, the report said.

It noted there were “troubling patterns” even in countries that were performing at middle to high levels of democratic standards.

In the past five years, progress has stalled across all of the indices IDEA studies, with some scores “the same as they were in 1990”, it said.

“Democratic systems have really wobbled over the past couple of decades and it quite clearly has become a burning issue in our age”, Casas-Zamora said.

There were, however, some signs of progress.

IDEA noted that people were coming together to push their governments to meet 21st-century demands, ranging from creating community-based childcare in Asia to reproductive freedoms in Latin America, and youth climate protests around the globe.

“But also in places like Iran, where people have gone out to demand freedom and equality and dignity,” Casas-Zamora said.

“So there are a few bright spots but the overall trend is very bleak.” 

Fresh clashes have broken out between police and protesters in a southern Chinese city, part of a wave of Covid lockdown-sparked demonstrations across the country that have morphed into demands for political freedoms.

China’s top security body warned late on Tuesday night that authorities would “crack down” on the protests, which are the most widespread since pro-democracy rallies in 1989 that were crushed with deadly force.

The protests erupted over the weekend across major cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, with China’s vast security apparatus moving swiftly to smother any further unrest.  

But new clashes broke out in China’s southern city of Guangzhou on Tuesday night and into Wednesday, according to witnesses and social media footage verified by AFP.

Security personnel in hazmat suits formed ranks shoulder-to-shoulder, taking cover under see-through riot shields, to make their way down a street in the southern city’s Haizhu district as glass smashed around them, videos posted on social media showed.

In the footage people could be heard screaming and shouting, as orange and blue barricades were pictured strewn across the ground.

People are seen throwing objects at the police, and later nearly a dozen men are filmed being taken away with their hands bound with cable ties.

A Guangzhou resident surnamed Chen told AFP on Wednesday that he witnessed around 100 police officers converge on Houjiao village in Haizhu district and arrest at least three men on Tuesday night.

– ‘Crackdown’ looms –

Anger over China’s zero-Covid policies — which involves lockdowns of huge numbers of people and has strangled the economy — has been the trigger for the protests.

A deadly fire last week in Urumqi, the capital of the northwestern region of Xinjiang, was the catalyst for the outrage, with people blaming Covid curbs for trapping victims inside the burning building.

But demonstrators have also demanded much wider political reforms in communist China, with some even calling for President Xi Jinping to stand down.

Signalling its zero-tolerance approach to the protests, China’s top security body called for a “crackdown” on what it described as “hostile forces”.

The body —  which oversees all domestic law enforcement in China — also agreed at its meeting that it was time to “crack down on illegal criminal acts that disrupt social order” as well as “safeguard overall social stability”.

The warning came after a heavy police presence across Beijing and Shanghai on Tuesday appeared to have quelled protests in those cities.

Some rallies did go ahead elsewhere on Monday and Tuesday, however. 

At Hong Kong’s oldest university, over a dozen people led the crowd Tuesday in chanting slogans such as “give me liberty or give me death”. 

“We are not foreign forces, we are Chinese citizens. China should have different voices,” one woman shouted, while another held a placard mourning victims of the Urumqi fire. 

In Hangzhou, just over 170 kilometres (105 miles) southwest of Shanghai, there was heavy security and sporadic protests in the city’s downtown on Monday night. 

– ‘Disregarding human lives’ –

China’s strict control of information and continued travel curbs have made verifying protester numbers across the vast country very challenging.

But the widespread rallies seen over the weekend are exceptionally rare in China.

The 1989 pro-democracy protests ended in bloodshed when the military moved in to Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

The latest unrest has drawn global attention, with solidarity protests springing up from Melbourne to Washington. 

“Officials are borrowing the pretext of Covid, but using excessively strict lockdowns to control China’s population,” said one 21-year-old Chinese protester in Washington, who gave only his surname, Chen.

“They disregarded human lives and caused many to die in vain,” he told AFP.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Tuesday that Washington’s position was “the same everywhere”, and that was to “support the right of people everywhere, to peacefully protest to make known their views, their concerns, and their frustrations”.

While China’s leaders are committed to zero-Covid, there have been some signs that central authorities may be seeking a path out of the rigid policy.

China’s National Health Commission (NHC) announced on Tuesday a renewed effort to expand low vaccination rates among the elderly — long seen as a key obstacle to relaxing the measures.

Many fear that opening the country up while swaths of the population remain not fully immunised could overwhelm China’s healthcare system and cause more than a million deaths.

China logged 37,612 domestic cases Wednesday, down from record highs over the weekend and comparatively tiny compared to caseloads in the West at the height of the pandemic.

Stroking a tiny spruce sapling, Swiss forest ranger Francois Villard fears the tree will not withstand global warming and live to a ripe old age like its ancestors.

The Risoud Forest, covering the border between France and Switzerland some 1,200 metres (3,900 feet) up in the Jura mountains, is filled with spruce trees which are hundreds of years old.

Their wood is perfect for crafting acoustic guitars, violins and other string instruments, making it sought after by luthiers around the world.

But climate change has brought drier, warmer weather, threatening the special tonal qualities of the wood.

“I have never seen so many dry trees,” says Villard, who is now approaching retirement.

He is saddened by the sight of so many spruces turning red, losing their needles and drying up, and by spending his days marking trees for felling.

“When I arrived here 30 years ago, there was an average annual temperature of five to six degrees Celsius (40-43 degrees Fahrenheit). Now we are well above that,” he tells AFP. 

Recent winters have been nowhere near as cold as before.

– Risoud resonance –

Spruces are the most common tree in Switzerland, and the hitherto stable climate in the Jura made the species perfect for producing tonewood for acoustic string instruments.

Stiff yet light softwoods like spruce are used to make soundboards — the top of the instrument — which amplifies the vibrations of the strings.

The soundboard must resonate easily with good tonal qualities, while resisting the strain of the strings on the bridge — characteristics that spruce possesses better than other woods.

The trees that meet the criteria perfectly are exceptionally rare — one in 1,000 or even 10,000, some say.

The tree must be 200 to 400 years old, and the bottom of the trunk must have a diameter of at least 50 centimetres (20 inches). It must be without knots or flowing resin.

The tree must have grown straight, slowly and, above all, with regular annual growth so that the tree rings are uniform and tight.

– Wood stock –

In the workshop of Swiss Resonance Wood, in the village of Le Brassus close to the French border, Quentin Durey sketches the outline of a guitar on a thin sheet of wood. Thousands more sheets are piled up to dry out over the years.

“There are about 2,000 guitar tops — classical, romantic and folk guitars,” explains company boss Theo Magnin.

The company sells to Europe, Japan and Mexico amongst other destinations.

But Magnin is worried.

“I don’t know where people who make musical instruments are going to get their supplies in 10 or 20 years,” he says.

“If there is no more wood, there will be no more instruments.” 

Philippe Ramel, a luthier whose workshop overlooks Vevey and Lake Geneva, makes two to four guitars a year, using spruce from Swiss Resonance Wood.

“We have to stock up, on the assumption that one day these trees will no longer be there” or will lose their special qualities, he tells AFP, noting that cedar wood from Lebanon, though not as good, could end up being the replacement.

Spruce tonewood should therefore be used wisely, he said, questioning whether factories should be churning out a thousand guitars a month.

“The guitar is a popular instrument. It may become a luxury instrument,” he says.

– Music of the future –

Dry conditions weaken the spruce trees, which then attract forest-ravaging bark beetles.

And extreme weather conditions can affect their growth, altering the regularity of the tree rings.

“If it continues like this, the stress on these trees will be greater and greater and it’s not clear that they will be able to get through it,” Villard says.

Normally the trees bear fruit every two to three years. But they are now doing so more frequently, driven by the need to reproduce and thereby ensure they continue to exist, Villard explains.

All is not lost. Letting hardwoods, particularly beech trees, grow in the spruce forests helps to retain moisture in the soil, as their broader span and foliage helps keep the sun’s rays off the ground.

Others note the millions of spruces already growing in the mountains.

“In the places which are sheltered from climate extremes, particularly north-facing ones, there really will be spruces for a very long time,” forest engineer Philippe Domont tells AFP.

“With the altitude, they can take advantage of a slight increase in temperatures — if the precipitation does not decrease too much,” he insists.

But Magnin, thinking further down the line, says: “We will have to find another wood to replace spruce.”

“That’s the music of the future.”