China's Xi Jinping Tightens Grip on Domestic Security Forces in First Broad Purge
Dozens of officials have been taken down in Mao-style rectification campaign; scrape the poison off the bone
https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-xi-jinping-tightens-grip-on-domestic-security-forces-in-first-broad-purge-11597773887
Within the first week after the call to action, Communist Party enforcers had launched investigations into at least 21 police and judicial officials, according to a media tally cited by the partys top law-enforcement commission. Dozens more have since been taken down, including the police chief of Shanghai, the most senior target thus far, and cadres who have won awards for good performance.
The rash of investigations marks the first time that Mr. Xi has unleashed a sweeping and systematic clean-up of the countrys powerful domestic-security apparatus. His push to forge police, prosecutors and judges who are absolutely loyal, absolutely pure and absolutely reliableas officials running the campaign have demandedpoints to thorny concerns that Mr. Xi faces at home even as he seeks to slow a downward spiral in relations with the U.S.
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Mr. Xi has targeted senior law-enforcement officials in the past, including retired security chief Zhou Yongkangwho was jailed for life in 2015 for corruption and abuses of poweras well as two vice ministers of public security felled in disciplinary probes over the past two years.
In launching a wider effort, some analysts say, Mr. Xi appears keen to tighten his grip over agencies vital to maintaining social stability and upholding his personal authority, which could prove critical as he confronts a pandemic-ravaged economy and rising tensions with the U.S. that could kick up social ferment and fuel dissent against his leadership.
Odds on trump praising this move this week?