Top Beijing police chief Fu Zhenghua heads up counter-terrorist armed patrols

Beijing police bureau chief Fu Zhenghua marched on the frontline alongside counter-terrorist police as the country bumps up public security against potential terrorist attacks, Chinese media said.

Fu, who is also a deputy chief of China’s Public Security Ministry, has gone on several armed patrols with senior special police officers around Beijing’s railway stations in the past few days, the Beijing Youth Daily said. More than 2,700 senior police officials have been ordered to follow in Fu’s footsteps and serve on the frontline to help “combat terrorism and maintain stability”.

The armed patrols Fu has headed has mainly been in locations deemed critical to public security, like the city’s four railway stations, the report said. In recent months railway stations in several cities across the nation have been targeted in violent attacks .

The 58-year-old Beijing police tsar, who is perhaps the most high-profile police officer in the nation, has previously participated in similar patrols. Last month he was photographed sporting the uniform of a special police officer, wearing a tactical police vest and armed with a handgun while he marched on the streets and directed frontline officers “to ensure they take down the enemy with one shot”.

He has also grabbed media headlines after being photographed inspecting security arrangements of the city’s college entrance exam centres, and for responding quickly to a teen assault case after a video showing the attack went viral online.

Fu has been tipped to head a special investigation into Zhou Yongkang, the nation’s former security tsar and previously one of the most powerful party elites. The case could potentially lead to an “unprecedented scandal” for the Communist Party, South China Morning Post previously reported. 

Fu started his career as a forensic expert and first gained prominence in 2010 when he launched a stringent citywiide “anti-vice campaign” including a crackdown on an elite nightclub, defying the predictions of some who said he was committing career suicide.