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China promotes its most sanctioned official to Tibetan Communist Party chief
- Wang Junzheng made his name as head of security in Xinjiang and in March was listed on multiple Western sanctions lists
- He will take over as party secretary in Tibet, replacing Wu Yingjie who is retiring
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A senior official sanctioned by the United States, Britain, the European Union and Canada for his role in China’s far western Xinjiang region has been appointed to the top job in Tibet.
Wang Junzheng’s promotion to Communist Party chief of the Tibet autonomous region was announced in Chinese state media on Tuesday.
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Wang, 58, became China’s highest ranking official to be widely sanctioned over accusations of human rights violations in March, during his tenure as Xinjiang’s deputy party secretary and security chief. His boss, Xinjiang party chief Chen Quanguo, appeared only on the Donald Trump administration’s sanctions list announced last year.
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Wang’s promotion underlines Beijing’s snub of the West’s response to its policies in Xinjiang, as well as its growing interest in the pool of officials who have been held up as examples of competence in areas with large ethnic minority populations.
He served as Xinjiang’s security chief from 2019 before starting his most recent role last year as political commissar of the paramilitary Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, while retaining his post as deputy party chief.
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Wang will be taking over in Tibet from Wu Yingjie when he retires at the age of 65 in two months’ time.
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