China names Qi Yanjun as second-in-command of nation’s police force

China has promoted Qi Yanjun as the second-in-command of the country’s massive police force.

The 59-year-old is the new deputy party secretary and deputy minister “in charge of daily operations” at the Ministry of Public Security, according to a post on the ministry’s website on Thursday. He now holds a full ministerial rank.

Qi’s role had previously been held by Wang but the position has been vacant for 16 months after Wang was appointed as public security minister in June 2022.

Qi started his career in the fire brigade in his home province of Shandong in the 1980s. He was transferred to head the fire department in Henan, where he served under Wang during his stint in the province from 2013 to 2015.

Wang went from Henan to Beijing, where he became police chief in 2015 and soon after Qi was transferred to the city’s fire brigade.

In 2020, Qi took over Wang’s Beijing police chief role after Wang became executive deputy minister of public security. Wang was named deputy public security minister in May last year and a month later was promoted to the minister role – the first career policeman to take that post in decades.

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Qi’s promotion suggests that the succession plan for China’s core security team is now “clear”, according to a politics researcher at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

“Barring unforeseen circumstances, Qi is clearly being groomed to be Wang Xiaohong’s successor,” said the researcher, who declined to be named.

“Wang is already 66 – he’s past the ministerial retirement age of 65. Although he might get an extension given his connections with Xi, it is still better to start preparing for the future,” the researcher said.

“It took Wang two years to get a full grasp of the public security ministry and Qi will also need some time to learn about the operations of this ministry, which controls millions of Chinese police officers.”