Overview
- The funeral for former premier Zhu Rongji is set for Tuesday, August 18 in Beijing with cremation planned there and national flags ordered at half-mast across mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Chinese diplomatic posts.
- President Xi Jinping led a centenary tribute for Jiang Zemin on Monday that praised Jiang’s record, defended the party’s decision on the 1989 protests and called on officials to unite behind party leadership.
- Beijing has tightened security around Tian’anmen Square and the route to the Babaoshan crematorium, and state authorities have tightly managed public expressions of grief through censorship and surveillance.
- Zhu is widely credited with driving 1990s market reforms, restructuring state-owned enterprises, stabilizing banks after the 1997 Asian financial shock and helping secure China’s 2001 entry into the WTO, reforms that boosted growth but also produced mass layoffs and later property-sector distortions.
- State outlets have emphasized Zhu’s reform legacy while some reports give conflicting ages for his death (97 versus 98), and commentators say the coordinated commemorations tie past reform-era achievements to present efforts to consolidate party authority ahead of next year’s congress.