Former U.S. officials have finally revealed what happened to a high-level Chinese official who mysteriously vanished in 2023, The Washington Post reported Sunday.

Former Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, who served as an interlocutor between China and the U.S., abruptly disappeared in the summer of 2023 and was later announced to be fired from his role, sparking rumors that he had been jailed or killed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). But as it turns out, Qin is alive and “not in jail,” though his “career is over,” according to two former U.S. officials who spoke to the Post on condition of anonymity, due to the sensitive nature of the topic. (RELATED: US, UK Spy Chiefs Hold Unprecedented Joint Public Meeting Over Global Challenges)

Qin has been demoted from his former role as China’s top diplomat, now serving instead in a lower position at a publishing house associated with the Chinese Foreign Ministry, the former U.S. officials told the Post. Qin has essentially “[fallen] from grace],” but the fact that he’s alive and not in prison means he’s “off the hook,” one of the former officials said.

It isn’t clear why Qin was demoted, but the most popular rumor among political analysts is that he had an extra-marital affair with a famous Chinese television reporter, Fu Xiaotian. Such acts by public officials are seen as a serious breach in China, and given Fu’s popularity and fame on social media, it’s possible that Qin’s alleged affair could have created a security risk for Beijing.

Those rumors have not been substantiated, although like Qin, Fu has vanished from the public eye for over a year, according to the Post.

Signs that Qin was alive to begin with first emerged in July, when his name appeared in a readout regarding other officials who had been dismissed, according to the Post. The readout claimed that Qin had “resigned” but remained a “comrade” of the CCP.

His place of work is now in a small office off an alley in Beijing, which includes a bookstore, the former officials told the Post. Asked by a reporter last week whether Qin was working there, other employees at the bookstore claimed they weren’t sure.

It’s not unprecedented for high-level Chinese officials to suddenly vanish from the public eye, leaving their whereabouts unknown. The CCP has ousted several officials, including some high-ranking military officials, over the course of the last year.

In some cases, those officials’ fate becomes known, but in others, it remains a mystery.

“[Qin] is somewhere in China,” a former translator for top Chinese officials recently told news outlet Al Jazeera. “You will never see him.”

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