From the Washington Post:
Suddenly Huang Ju was back, with the familiar quizzical eyebrows arching from behind large wire-framed glasses, sitting alongside other members of the Chinese Communist Party’s supreme policymaking body, the Politburo’s nine-member Standing Committee.
Huang’s return, which was broadcast on official television Monday evening and reported prominently in the next day’s People’s Daily, came after five months during which he had dropped from sight, generating a swirl of rumors, reports and more or less informed speculation about what had happened to one of China’s most powerful men.
Huang’s reemergence settled nothing about his status — people still wondered whether he was deathly ill, under investigation for a security breach or tainted by a wife with her hand in the till. But it dramatically illustrated the secrecy behind which China’s leaders work, a dark cloak that hides even the most mundane details about how they rule the world’s most populous nation. [Full text]
