‘Missing’ for more than two weeks: China’s defense minister has the US worried

The US government is said to be looking into the disappearance of Chinese Defence Minister Li Shangfu, who hasn’t been seen in public for more than two weeks.

According to the US, Shangfu has also been fired from his role as defense minister, as the Financial Times reported.

The US ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, tweeted on X, “President Xi’s cabinet lineup is now resembling Agatha Christie’s novel ‘And Then There Were None’.”

He said that the abduction of the rocket force commanders and foreign minister Qin Gang coincided with the disappearance of defence minister Li Shangfu, who hasn’t been seen in public for two weeks.

In the battle against unemployment, who will prevail? China’s youth or Xi’s cabinet? Emanuel said.

Another quote he used was from Shakespeare’s Hamlet, coupled with the phrase “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” The defence minister, Li Shangfu, hasn’t been seen or heard from in the last three weeks, to start. Secondly, he missed his trip to Vietnam. He’s now skipping his meeting with the Singaporean Chief of Navy because he was placed under house arrest? There can be too many individuals present. The good news is that I learned he used the Country Garden property to pay off his mortgage.

Shangfu is alleged to have disappeared after Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang went missing in July.

President Xi Jinping of China dismissed two senior generals from the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force, an elite unit in charge of the nation’s conventional and nuclear missiles, over two months ago.

Vietnamese authorities allegedly said on Thursday that Li abruptly canceled a meeting last week owing to a “health condition,” according to a report by news agency Reuters.

The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Li in 2018 in connection with China’s purchase of Russian weaponry. At the time, Li was in command of the PLA’s primary division for acquiring and manufacturing weapons.