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Jiang Zemin: the president who took China from Tiananmen pariah to rising power
- Jiang is hailed for mending ties with the West, the handover of Hong Kong, modernising the Communist Party at home and a successful bid to host Olympics
- In a country led by inscrutable politicians, charismatic ‘Uncle Toad’ came to be admired for his distinctive appearance and idiosyncratic diplomacy
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Jiang Zemin, China’s top leader in the 1990s and the early 2000s, has left behind a country with a much higher global standing and an economy far more integrated with the world than Communist rulers before him knew.
Jiang, who ruled the country from 1989 to 2002, died in Shanghai from leukaemia and multi-organ failure just after noon on Wednesday, according to an official announcement by state news agency Xinhua. He was 96.
It was under Jiang’s watch that China underwent some of the biggest developments that would further integrate it with the US-led global system and elevate its status as a world power.
They included the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, when the city returned to Chinese sovereignty from British colonial rule, and China formally becoming a member of the World Trade Organization in 2001.
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Former Chinese president Jiang Zemin dies at the age of 96
Former Chinese president Jiang Zemin dies at the age of 96
It was also under Jiang in 2001 that Beijing secured host nation status for the 2008 Summer Olympics, a first for the country.
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