New step expected in China drama

Press, 15 October 1976, Page 5

New step expected in China drama

NZPA

Tokyo

China’s political leadership appears to have held an important meeting in the Great Hall of the People, Peking, touching off speculation that there may be further dramatic developments in an already unpredictable climate which has prevailed in China’s administration since the death of Mao Tse-tung on September 9, the Associated Press reported.

Speculation centred on* a possible gathering of senior Government and party leaders to shore up the position of Prime Minister Hua Kuo-feng or perhaps prepare a formal announcement to the Chinese people that he had been named party chairman, succeeding the late Mao Tse-tung.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman told foreign reporters on Tuesday that Mr Hua had been appointed to the post. Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported that scores of limousines were seen parked outside the Great Hall of the People on Wednesday night. Traffic control in the area was strengthened, Kyodo said, and policemen patrolled nearby streets. There was no confirmation of the meeting from Chinese officials, but unnamed observer were quoted by Kyodo as saying that some sort of session was held to solidify Mr Hua’s leadership. Despatches from Japanese correspondents based in Pe-

king said the capital otherwise remained calm, despite reports that at least 30 people associated with the Chinese Hierarchy’s radical faction — including Chiang Ching, Mao Tse-tung’s widow —had been arrested recently for plotting a coup. The Chinese yesterday provided the first likely indication that the Leftist leaders had been purged. Foreign correspondents who tried to buy official photographs of the four at the New China News Agency were told that none were available. An assistant said the department was busy, and the only pictures for sale were of the new Communist Party chairman, Mr Hua. In the past, photographs of disgraced leaders have been quickly withdrawn. An official spokesman said he had “no comment” on foreign press reports of about 30 more arrests. Western diplomats and other sources said they bad heard nothing to substantiate the reports.

So far the Chinese have made no attempt to deny that the four Politburo members —Chiang Ching, Wang Hungwen, Chang Chun-chiao, and

Yao Wen-yuan — have been plotting a coup.

“Further arrests can obviously not be ruled out, but there has been no evidence to indicate they have yet occurred,” one well-informed source said.

Chairman Hua was yesterday given the sort of press coverage previously reserved for Mao.

His meeting on Wednesday with Mr Michael Somare, the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, was splashed across newspaper front pages. A smiling Mr Hua was pictured seated, gesturing with his right hand, two women interpreters behind him. Informed Western analysts now believe that the decision to appoint Mr Hua as only the second chairman of the Chinese Communist Party was taken shortly after Mao’s funeral on September 18. At the same time, it was probably decided to make Mr Chang Chun-chiao the premier, the Prime Minister.

What happened after is a mystery, but some time last week the decision to appoint M-- Chang was scrapped, and he and the other three Shanghai radicals were put under arrest, the sources said.