Coronavirus: Xian officials sacked over handling of outbreak as cases fall below 100

Wang Bin and Cui Shiyue – senior figures in the city’s worst-hit district – were removed from their posts to ‘strengthen’ the battle

It comes as locked down residents have complained of food shortages, and as the number of local infections are going down

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A courier gets tested at a mobile site in Xian’s Beilin district on Sunday. The city has just begun a seventh round of compulsory mass testing. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 3:31pm, 3 Jan 2022Updated: 7:13pm, 3 Jan 2022

Two senior officials have been sacked over their handling of an ongoing Covid-19 outbreak in the northwest Chinese city of Xian, where locked down residents have complained about food shortages.

It comes as the daily case number in the city of 13 million – known for its Terracotta Warriors – dropped below 100 for the first time since December 24.

The two officials removed from their posts on Sunday were both senior figures in Yanta, the worst-hit district in the city. They were Wang Bin, Communist Party secretary of the district committee, and his deputy Cui Shiyue, who was also secretary of the district’s leading party group, according to state-run People’s Daily.

It said the decision was made by the Shaanxi provincial party committee to “further strengthen epidemic prevention and control in the Yanta district of Xian”.

Just over a week ago, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said 26 city officials would be punished over their response to the outbreak, including mismanaging a quarantine hotel. The outbreak, which began on December 9, has been linked to a case on a flight from Pakistan.

Across China, 101 new local infections were reported on Sunday, 90 of them in Xian. The city has reported 1,663 local cases since the outbreak began, the National Health Commission said on Monday.

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