China supposedly investigates 3rd defence minister in a row for possible corruption

A spokesperson for China's MFA said the reports were "just chasing shadows".

Tan Min-Wei

November 27, 2024, 09:15 PM

China’s Defence Minister Dong Jun is allegedly under investigation as part of a wider operation to uncover graft in China’s military, according to a Financial Times report.

However, a China government spokesperson denied such allegations.

Not according to PLAN

On November 27 the Financial Times reported that Dong Jun had been caught up in a wave of corruption investigations into the PLA.

Dong is a People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) Admiral, who was appointed China’s minister of defence in December 2023.

Dong visited Singapore in this capacity, speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue.

The FT report quotes United States officials, who said that China’s president Xi Jinping is conducting a wave of investigations into the PLA that has now ensnared Dong, although it was not clear what kind of allegations Dong is supposedly facing.

Airtight

If the reports turn out to be true, this would make Dong the third defence minister in a row to face corruption allegations in two years, and the fourth minister in the same time.

Both of Dong’s predecessors, Li Shangfu and Wei Fenghe, were both been charged with corruption, and expelled from the Communist Party of China (CPC), after disappearing from public view for a time.

In addition, China’s previous foreign minister, Qin Gang, was also similarly removed his his position and the CPC after facing corruption charges.

The FT quoted a China analyst, the China Strategies Group’s Christopher Johnson, as saying that Dong was appointed after being assured by military personnel that Dong’s vetting was “airtight”.

After the allegations came to light, Xi would be “left to wonder, what corner of the PLA is not corrupt.”

Chasing shadows

But Reuters reports that a spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry dismissed the reports of Dong’s alleged corruption at a regular briefing.

The spokesperson described the reports as “just shadow-chasing”.

This outright denial is distinct from previous allegations, where the personnel involved had disappeared from public view for several months before charges against them were ultimately confirmed.

Dong, however, was seen in Laos as recently as a week ago, where he was attending the Asean Defence Minister’s Meeting Plus in Vientiane.

While there, Dong had declined to meet with his U.S. counterpart Lloyd Austin, ostensibly in protest of U.S. delivering military equipment to Taiwan, despite Xi and outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden having met the week before at the 2024 APEC summit in Peru.