President Xi Jinping will use the event to consolidate his grip on power

On the western side of Tiananmen Square, the Great Hall of the People will this week be the setting for the formal proceedings of the 19th Congress of the ruling Chinese Communist Party. The event, held every five years, isn’t normally of huge interest outside China. But this one is generating more attention than usual. This time is different.

For a start, China’s footprint in the global economy is now bigger than ever. The country has been gifted a global role by President Trump that its leaders couldn’t have imagined a year ago: it is central to resolving tensions on the Korean peninsula, and president Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road infrastructure initiative is attracting a lot of attention. Earlier this year, for example, the UK’s interest was drawn to it by the arrival of the first ever freight train service from Yiwu, about 180 miles south of Shanghai, to London Gateway Terminal.

The real reasons that this Congress is significant, though, are all to do with Chinese politics, and the implications for the power of President Xi Jinping…..Read more: