In the previous article Besides Jack Ma, China Has Silenced 4 Other Billionaires, has been discussed regarding the disappearance of Jack Ma, Jimmy Lai, and Guo Wei. We will discuss how China silenced the other two billionaires.
Ren Zhiqiang
In April 2020, another Chinese tycoon, Ren Zhiqiang, faced a police investigation. He criticized President Xi’s way of dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic. Ren faces charges of committing a “serious offense” of discipline and law.
Quoting AFP, the 69-year-old man disappeared from the public in March. Which is after writing a paper criticizing Xi’s response to the coronavirus outbreak in China.
In addition, Ren also criticized the party’s crackdown on press freedom and intolerance of dissent.
“Without a media that represents the interests of the people by publishing the actual facts, people’s lives are threatened by viruses and other major diseases,” wrote Ren, criticizing the government’s restrictions on press freedom.
Then in late September, Ren was sentenced to 18 years in prison for the criticism. But he faces a court verdict on August 22 on charges of corruption and embezzlement of public funds.
Xiao Jianhua
Founder of the Beijing-based Tomorrow Group, Xiao Jianhua was kidnapped in January 2017 while staying at the Four Seasons hotel, Hong Kong. He disappeared in Chinese custody, while Beijing confiscated some of his company assets.
Some media outlets reported that Xiao was taken away in a wheelchair by plainclothes Chinese security agents, covered his head with a sheet, and taken across the border to China.
The disappearance of the Chinese billionaire is part of a Chinese anti-corruption operation that some critics believe has been used to eliminate President Xi’s political enemies.
Xiao was known as the student leader when he was still in college.
Regarding his arrest, China’s stock market regulator accused Xiao and other tycoons of withdrawing potential investors from China’s stock market.
In 2014 he denied moving to Hong Kong to avoid investigations into a corruption case launched by the Chinese government.
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