Zero-Covid in China Key to Xi Legacy as He Eyes Third Term

For many in China, strict Covid curbs are a source of ongoing misery, but for President Xi Jinping, they are a triumph NICOLAS ASFOURI AFP/File
For many in China, strict Covid curbs are a source of ongoing misery, but for President Xi Jinping, they are a triumph NICOLAS ASFOURI AFP/File
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Zero-Covid in China Key to Xi Legacy as He Eyes Third Term

For many in China, strict Covid curbs are a source of ongoing misery, but for President Xi Jinping, they are a triumph NICOLAS ASFOURI AFP/File
For many in China, strict Covid curbs are a source of ongoing misery, but for President Xi Jinping, they are a triumph NICOLAS ASFOURI AFP/File

For many in China, years of grueling lockdowns and privacy invasions aimed at extinguishing Covid have caused misery.

For President Xi Jinping, the virus curbs are a triumph, AFP said.

His zero-tolerance approach to Covid has become synonymous with the efforts to cement his authority over China and its ruling Communist Party (CCP).

The endgame begins on October 16, when thousands of party delegates will gather in Beijing for a major party congress at which he is expected to secure a historic third term.

"Xi's legacy and the legitimacy of the CCP are bound to the success of the zero-Covid campaign," Diana Fu, an expert on Chinese domestic politics at the Brookings Institution think tank, told AFP.

While the rest of the world has largely moved to live with Covid, Xi has insisted on draconian policies aimed at eliminating the virus.

The approach has crippled growth in the world's second-largest economy, which was already struggling with a debt-laden property sector and high youth unemployment.

But Xi has dug in his heels, declaring zero-Covid China's most "economic and effective" path forward, while maintaining policies that have deepened the state's control over the lives of its 1.4 billion people.

- Tests and QR codes -
The headline-grabbing planks of the campaign continue to be the snap lockdowns -- sometimes confining tens of millions of people to their homes for weeks or months.

In one of the recent shutdowns, some residents in the megacity of Chengdu were not allowed to go outside even when an earthquake shook their apartment buildings.

And in the economic hub of Shanghai, a months-long lockdown led to rare scenes of protests from middle-class and wealthy Chinese.

Public frustration has also pushed past China's internet censors and onto social media.

In one of the highest-profile cases, a bus crash in rural Guizhou province that killed 27 people on the way to a Covid quarantine facility sparked a surge of online criticism.

General curbs that erode privacy and limit movement have also caused anger and resentment.

Residents in many cities must obtain a negative coronavirus test every few days to gain access to public spaces.

They then use their smartphones to scan QR codes at entrances to offices, malls and restaurants and bring up their latest test results.

A green icon indicates they are free to enter, while red or amber means they may have, respectively, tested positive or passed near someone who has.

That could lead to anything from a few days of home isolation to weeks at a quarantine facility.

The system also tracks people's movements, leaving it open to abuse, such as when authorities were accused of thwarting anti-corruption protests this year by turning participants' codes red.

Before the pandemic, China's citizens were already under heavy surveillance.

Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute at the University of London, said the Covid-monitoring apparatus was "in line with the model of social control" spearheaded by Xi.

- 'No choice' -
China argues zero-Covid places human life above material concerns and has helped to avert the public health crises seen in other countries.

Officials have also voiced fears that the virus would overwhelm China's patchy healthcare system if allowed to spread unchecked, particularly in elderly rural communities.

So far, China has reported just over 5,000 Covid deaths compared with more than a million in the United States.

But while the milder Omicron virus variant has reduced the risk of reopening in many countries, China's curbs continue to extract hefty economic and social costs.

"They have to abandon zero-Covid ultimately," said Jin Dong-yan, a professor at Hong Kong University's School of Biomedical Sciences, calling it "wrong and against all scientific evidence".

The policy's initial success has created a sense of inertia among policymakers, according to Allen Wu, a professor at Nanjing University's medical school who has advised the World Health Organization.

"There is this mentality that we did such a wonderful job in 2020 and 2021... if we (now) do nothing and a huge number of people get infected, that basically gives away all you have achieved," he told AFP.

Many in China speak favorably of zero-Covid, with Fu of the Brookings Institution saying state propaganda had convinced most people of the need to cut cases "at all human and economic costs".

"A vast number of Chinese citizens still support draconian measures despite evident personal suffering," she said.

Even those at the extreme end of the policy have no option but to submit.

Airline engineer Ian Jiang has spent 200 days in isolation hotels throughout the pandemic, and China continues to enforce quarantines for overseas arrivals of up to two weeks.

Jiang, 38, described the measures as "very inconvenient for my personal life".

"But that's the Chinese government's policy," said Jiang. "You have no choice."

There is unlikely to be much overt opposition when Xi receives the adulation of party delegates at this month's Congress.

"The campaign, no matter the actual socioeconomic outcomes, will continue to be hailed as a triumph of Chinese socialism," Fu said.



Columbia University Activist Mahmoud Khalil Can Be Deported, Immigration Judge Rules

Supporters of Mahmoud Khalil walk away from the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana, April 11, 2025 after the immigration court hearing for Khalil, who is being held at the center for pro-Palestinian activism. (AFP)
Supporters of Mahmoud Khalil walk away from the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana, April 11, 2025 after the immigration court hearing for Khalil, who is being held at the center for pro-Palestinian activism. (AFP)
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Columbia University Activist Mahmoud Khalil Can Be Deported, Immigration Judge Rules

Supporters of Mahmoud Khalil walk away from the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana, April 11, 2025 after the immigration court hearing for Khalil, who is being held at the center for pro-Palestinian activism. (AFP)
Supporters of Mahmoud Khalil walk away from the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana, April 11, 2025 after the immigration court hearing for Khalil, who is being held at the center for pro-Palestinian activism. (AFP)

Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil can be forced out of the country as a national security risk, an immigration judge in Louisiana ruled Friday after lawyers argued the legality of deporting the activist who participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

The government’s contention that Khalil’s presence in the US posed "potentially serious foreign policy consequences" satisfied requirements for deportation, Immigration Judge Jamee E. Comans said at a hearing in Jena.

Comans said the government had "established by clear and convincing evidence that he is removable."

After the immigration court hearing, Khalil attorney Marc Van Der Hout told a New Jersey federal judge that Khalil will appeal to the Board of Immigration Appeals within weeks.

"So nothing is going to happen quickly," he said.

Addressing the judge at the end of the immigration hearing, Khalil recalled her saying at a hearing earlier in the week that "there's nothing more important to this court than due process rights and fundamental fairness."

"Clearly what we witnessed today, neither of these principles were present today or in this whole process," he added. "This is exactly why the Trump administration has sent me to the court, 1,000 miles away from my family."

Van Der Hout also criticized the hearing's fairness.

"Today, we saw our worst fears play out: Mahmoud was subject to a charade of due process, a flagrant violation of his right to a fair hearing, and a weaponization of immigration law to suppress dissent," Van Der Hout said in a statement.

Khalil, a legal US resident, was detained by federal immigration agents March 8 in the lobby of his university-owned apartment, the first arrest under President Donald Trump’s promised crackdown on students who joined campus protests against the war in Gaza.

Within a day, he was flown across the country to an immigration detention center in Jena, far from his attorneys and wife, a US citizen due to give birth soon.

Khalil’s lawyers have challenged the legality of his detention, saying the Trump administration is trying to block free speech protected by the First Amendment.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has cited a rarely used statute to justify Khalil’s deportation, which gives him power to deport those who pose "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States."

At Friday’s hearing, Van Der Hout told the judge that the government’s submissions to the court prove the attempt to deport his client "has nothing to do with foreign policy" and said the government is trying to deport him for protected speech.

Khalil, a Palestinian born and raised in Syria after his grandparents were forcibly removed from their ancestral home in Tiberias, isn’t accused of breaking any laws during the protests at Columbia.

The government, however, has said noncitizens who participate in such demonstrations should be expelled from the country for expressing views that the administration considers to be antisemitic and "pro-Hamas," referring to the Palestinian armed group that attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.

Khalil, a 30-year-old international affairs graduate student, had served as a negotiator and spokesperson for student activists at Columbia University who took over a campus lawn last spring to protest Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.

The university summoned police to dismantle the encampment after a small group of protesters seized an administration building. Khalil is not accused of participating in the building occupation and wasn’t among those arrested.

But images of his maskless face at protests and his willingness to share his name with reporters have drawn scorn from those who viewed the protesters and their demands as antisemitic. The White House accused Khalil of "siding with terrorists" but has yet to cite any support for the claim.

Federal judges in New York and New Jersey have ordered the government not to deport Khalil while his case plays out in multiple courts.

The Trump administration has said it is taking at least $400 million in federal funding away from research programs at Columbia and its medical center to punish it for not adequately fighting what it considers to be antisemitism on campus.

Some Jewish students and faculty complained about being harassed during the demonstrations or ostracized because of their faith or their support of Israel.

Immigration authorities have cracked down on other critics of Israel on college campuses, arresting a Georgetown University scholar who had spoken out on social media about the Israel-Gaza war, canceling the student visas of some protesters and deporting a Brown University professor who they said had attended the Lebanon funeral of a leader of Hezbollah, another armed group that has fought with Israel.