Loyal and experienced, China’s other top leaders take posts

By HUIZHONG WU
Associated Press

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — With Chinese leader Xi Jinping receiving a norms-breaking third five-year term as president, the other six men who serve with him on the ruling Communist Party’s all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee are taking up their new portfolios. Chief among them, the party’s second-in-command Li Qiang is widely expected to take over as premier, nominally in charge of the Cabinet and caretaker of the economy. Li is best known for ruthlessly enforcing a brutal “zero-COVID” lockdown on Shanghai last spring. Shortly after Xi received unanimous approval from the National People’s Congress on Friday, the party’s third-ranking official Zhao Leji was made head of the nearly 3,000-member ceremonial legislature. Han Zheng was made vice president.