Man of Action: China's Xi Jinping cements his status with ‘landmark resolution'

In unusually effusive language even for a Chinese leader, a party statement said the meeting was ‘of decisive significance’ for ‘the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation’

BEIJING: A high-profile conclave of China’s ruling Communist Party on Thursday adopted a landmark resolution to cement President Xi Jinping’s “core” status in the country’s political history and cleared the decks for him to extend his rule for a record third term next year and perhaps beyond.

The resolution — the only third of its kind in the party’s 100-year history after one issued under party founder Mao Zedong and his successor Deng Xiaoping — was reviewed and adopted at the sixth plenary session of the 19th CPC Central Committee, held in Beijing from November 8 to 11, an official communique released at the end of the meeting said.

The 14-page communique eulogizing Xi’s leadership and his “core” status in the party makes it explicitly clear that he would continue in power for an unprecedented third term after completing his second five-year term next year and perhaps beyond not retiring, unlike his predecessors.

The Plenum, attended by about 400 senior party leaders, decided to advance next year’s once-in-a-five-year party Congress to the middle of the year from towards the end where Xi’s third term was formally expected to be approved.