According to China Daily citing an official statement, on April 28, 2026, a senior official from the CCP’s Organization Department, the Party body that manages personnel appointments across the entire government and military, convened a leadership meeting at China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs. The official announced that Zhang Zhu, deputy party secretary of Xinjiang and party secretary of the regional capital Urumqi, would take over as the ministry’s party secretary. Han Jun, the incumbent agriculture minister, was simultaneously relieved of the same position.
The circumstances were conspicuous. Han is 62. Under CCP norms, minister-level officials, classified in Party bureaucratic terminology as “zhengbu” or full ministry-grade, are generally not required to retire until 65. Han had served as agriculture minister for less than two years. State media reports on the transition made no mention of any new assignment, nor did they include the standard bureaucratic phrase indicating he would be “given another posting.” His name vanished from the ministry’s official leadership roster within hours.
Han Jun was born in December 1963 in Gaoqing County, Shandong province. He holds a doctoral degree in agricultural economics from Northwest Agriculture University. His career traced a long arc through think-tank and policy-drafting roles before he entered provincial administration. From March 2001, he served as director of the Rural Economy Research Department at the State Council Development Research Center, the central government’s main economic policy think tank, and was appointed the center’s deputy director in November 2010.
In October 2014, Han moved to the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission Office, the Party body that coordinates economic policymaking at the highest levels, serving as deputy director. In April 2017, he took on the concurrent role of director of the Central Rural Work Leading Group Office, the body responsible for formulating the CCP’s agricultural policies. In March 2018, he became deputy party secretary and vice minister of the newly reorganized Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.
His entry into provincial administration came in November 2020, when he was appointed deputy party secretary of Jilin province in China’s northeast, then acting governor, and governor in January 2021. In March 2023, he was transferred to Anhui province in eastern China as party secretary, the top political post in the province, and was elected chairman of Anhui’s provincial legislature in January 2024.
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According to his Wikipedia page, on June 28, 2024, Han was abruptly recalled from Anhui and reassigned as party secretary of the Agriculture Ministry. He formally assumed the title of agriculture minister in September 2024. Despite those two provincial postings, the bulk of his career had been spent in agricultural policy work at the central level.
Han’s career tracked Xi’s political fortunes
Han Jun’s factional background matters. His most important patron was Liu He, the former economic vice prime minister who served as chief economic adviser to Xi Jinping, the CCP’s general secretary and China’s top leader, and led trade negotiations with the United States before retiring from government in 2023. Han worked under Liu for years at the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission Office, serving as his deputy, and the two overlapped for an extended period at the State Council Development Research Center.
It was Xi who sent Han to govern Jilin and then Anhui. Provincial party secretaries of major provinces are considered strong candidates for promotion to the Politburo, and the postings signaled that Xi was building Han up for higher office. That trajectory was cut short when Han was recalled from Anhui in June 2024.
The timing matters. June 2024 was the period when speculation was running at its peak, both among overseas Chinese commentators and some Western analysts, that Xi had suffered a meaningful loss of control inside the Party. The signals were ambiguous and have never been conclusively interpreted, but the concurrent reassignment of Han from a powerful provincial post back to a technical ministry role was consistent with the idea that Xi’s ability to protect and advance his chosen officials had weakened.
Overseas Chinese commentators argue that Han’s elevation under Xi, his rapid sidelining, and now his pre-retirement dismissal serve as a proxy measure of Xi’s political fortunes. When Xi was ascendant, Han rose. When Xi’s position became contested, Han was pulled back. His formal removal has darkened the picture further.
Han’s fall comes as Xi’s allies face mounting crises
The removal of Han Jun did not occur in isolation. Zhang Youxia, one of the two vice chairmen of the CCP’s Central Military Commission, the body that commands China’s military, was reported to have been detained suddenly, triggering unrest within the officer corps. Ma Xingrui, Xi’s longtime ally who runs the Party’s internal security apparatus, was officially announced as under investigation. Li Ganjie, the Party’s chief personnel official, and Li Xi, the head of the Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, have both been subjects of adverse reports suggesting they too may face consequences.
All five, Zhang, Ma, Li Ganjie, Li Xi, and now Han, are officials closely associated with Xi’s political project. Their simultaneous difficulties, compressed into a matter of weeks, are difficult to dismiss as coincidence.
