Wang Yi back as China's foreign minister after Qin Gang's abrupt exit

China has reinstated veteran diplomat Wang Yi as the country's foreign minister, replacing Qin Gang, who was abruptly "removed" from the post after a mysterious one-month absence, state media reported, fueling speculations in the halls of power in Beijing and beyond.

Wang, 69, previously served as Beijing's top diplomat for 10 years from 2013 to December 2022, before returning to the post on Tuesday.

"China's top legislature voted to appoint Wang Yi as foreign minister... as it convened a session on Tuesday," state media outlet Xinhua said.

"Qin Gang was removed from the post of foreign minister," it added.

The South China Morning Post, however, reported that a special session of the rubber-stamp legislature, made the decision to remove Qin as early as Monday.

The report did not give a reason for Qin's removal, but said President Xi Jinping signed a presidential order to enact the decision.

Qin, who served as China's ambassador to the United States from 2021 to January of this year, had been seen as a confidant of Xi and many analysts attributed his recent fast rise through the diplomatic ranks to their relationship.

China has remained tight-lipped for weeks about the fate of Qin, who has not been seen in public since June 25 when he met Russia's deputy foreign minister Andrey Rudenko in Beijing.

His absence sparked a storm of speculation that he had been removed from office or was subject to an official investigation.

Asked repeatedly about Qin's situation on Tuesday, officials refused to give any information, insisting it was business as usual.

"I would not be surprised if the reason given is health-related, no matter what is going on since anything discipline-related would reflect badly on Xi and his decision to break protocol to promote Qin," analyst Bill Bishop wrote in his Sinocism newsletter before the announcement.

Qin's duties had lately been taken on Wang, who has been promoted as state councilor since leaving the foreign ministry at the end of 2022. He outranks Qin in the government hierarchy and in seniority.

Qin had replaced Wang as foreign minister only in December 30, 2022.

Information vacuum

Qin's ministry said on July 11 he was unable to attend a meeting of Southeast Asian Nations foreign ministers in Indonesia for unspecified "health reasons", but the statement further raised eyebrows given his absence in the important regional meeting that was also attended by Western diplomats, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

"Everyone is concerned about something but cannot discuss it publicly," Hu Xijin, a prominent commentator with the state tabloid Global Times, said in a post on the Chinese social media application, Weibo, before the announcement of Qin's dismissal on Tuesday.

"A balance needs to be struck between maintaining the situation and respecting the public's right to know," he said.

Earlier this month, a visit by the European Union's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell to Beijing was abruptly called.

And Bloomberg reported on Friday that a visit by UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly was postponed due to Qin's absence.

Wang had been filling in for Qin since latter's disappearance, including a high-profile meeting with former US Secretary of State John Kerry, who currently serves as the top climate representative of President Joe Biden.

Likened to a "silver fox" by China’s state media and online admirers due to his greying hair and diplomatic wiles, Wang currently heads the Chinese Co mmunist Party Foreign Affairs Commission, the top foreign policy decision-making body.

Regarded by some of his foreign counterparts as suave and charming, he has become increasingly tough in recent years: a proponent of China's aggressive and often abrasive "wolf warrior" style of diplomacy.

After becoming foreign minister, Qin's comments on hot button issues such as Taiwan and China's relations with Russia did not diverge in any significant way from those of his predecessor.

In his first comments as foreign minister, Qin said in solving challenges common to all mankind, China's diplomacy would offer "Chinese wisdom, Chinese initiatives and Chinese strength".

In an essay published in American bi-monthly magazine the National Interest late last year, Qin gave an overview of China's foreign policy and reiterated that China-US relations were not a "zero-sum game" with one side gaining at the expense of the other.

'Wolf warrior'

Qin, 57, became one of the country's youngest foreign ministers on his appointment in December 2022 after a brief stint as US ambassador, enjoying a meteoric rise to the top that analysts partly attributed to his closeness to Xi.

After disappearing from the public, his ministry said he was off work for unspecified health reasons, but the lack of detailed information further fueled questions.

Born in the northern city of Tianjin in 1966, Qin studied International Politics at one of China's most prestigious schools for aspiring diplomats, the University of International Relations in Beijing.

After graduating, Qin entered the diplomatic service, working in several jobs at the foreign ministry as well as postings at the Chinese Embassy in Britain.

Qin was twice foreign ministry spokesman, between 2006 and 2014, and chief protocol officer between 2014 and 2018, overseeing many of Xi's interactions with foreign leaders.

As ministry spokesman, he stood out for being one of the first diplomats to speak aggressively in defence of China's increasingly assertive foreign policy, a style that became known as "wolf warrior" diplomacy.

"Those of us in the press corps who have known Qin for years have seen a deft, wily player... who knows how to bend with the prevailing wind from Beijing," wrote Melinda Liu in a profile for Foreign Policy magazine.

But he also displayed willingness to work with the United States, declaring upon his arrival in Washington as ambassador in July 2021, after a period of unusual public vitriol between US and Chinese officials, that relations held "great opportunities and potential".

Relations between the two big powers did not markedly improve during his time as ambassador, or afterwards, however.

The two sides have been often at odds over issues including trade, technology, and the self-ruled, democratic island of Taiwan, which Beijing claims and Washington supports.

Qin, who analysts said was likely to have been appointed foreign minister to help stabilise relations with the US, held a 5-1/2 hour meeting and a dinner with Blinken in June in talks that both sides called candid and constructive.

A few days later, on June 25, he held talks with officials from Sri Lanka, Russia and Vietnam in Beijing but then began the unexplained public absence.

Qin's departure on Tuesday, however, may not be the end of speculations in the corridors of power around the world about what is going on the Beijing.

"The whole situation... underlines that the CCP system might not be as streamlined and stable as one might assume," Moritz Rudolf from Yale's Paul Tsai China Center.

"The quick rise of Qin Gang might have created some resentment among other senior people within the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs," Rudolf told AFP news agency.