but what we do know, as we speak in real time, images of qin gang are being removed from the website,eferences to his previous activities are being scrubbed. so it suggests there is political infighting going on. nicole: qin was seen as many as a rising star and he did not mince his words when talking about china's relations with the west. in kicking him out, did president xi move a threat to his own power? -- remove a threat to his own power? ali: there's a lot of speculation. one assertion that has been made is that the speed of qin gang assent rankled some of his more senior colleagues. certainly there were personal frictions between them. i think some personal animus at work, political motivation at work. but now, wang yi will be overseeing not only the substance of foreign policy but also its implementation. he's a much better known entity diplomatically. he will also be more challenging for the u.s. you mentioned the meeting between the u.s. secretary of state antony blinken and his recent visits to beijing. it's noticeable his meetings with qin gang ere -- were warmer. wang yi

qin gang hasn't been seen in months. >> this was the last time chinese foreign minister qin gang waseen in public, in beijing in june. speculation had mounted about his whereabouts. state media have confirmed that qin gang has been removed from his post. no region had -- reason has been given. the announcement was made after a meeting of the standing committee, a high level parliamentary body. top diplomat wang yi will resume the post, which eat -- he held for 10 years. this is expected to cause a people. >> it is an embarrassment for china. qin gang is the public face of china with the world on the international stage and it is hard to overstate the impact, the negative impact this is having among diplomats around the world. >> qin's absence from diplomatic activities was unusual especially as beijing and washington are trying to stabilize ties. he hosted the secretary of state antony blinken on june 18, but missed other high-level visits in the following weeks. he was absent from a foreign ministers meeting in jakarta due to health reasons, officials said. qin was known as one of x

he saw this fast track promotion, qin gang.e held a position which is senior to the foreign minister, of state counselor. what happens to xi jinping's diplomatic policies now? john: unfortunately, shery, the answer is we don't know yet. if and only had mr. qin gang replaced by the former foreign minister, wang yi, we have not gotten expiration or detail about what exactly happened. we may in the future get that. if there is some sort of -- and we don't know if there is some sort of investigation of qin gang. the practice in the past has been to announce that, so we think there would be some sort of announcement. if there is a health issue, as the foreign ministry said in the past, there would be trying to explain why qin gang was not going to the foreign ministers meeting in indonesia. that might be announced later as well, but there is no guarantee that we will ultimately find out exactly what happened. haidi: he keeps his role as state counselor, at least for now. does that tell us anything? there's not a lot of certainty as

about his disappearance from public view, china has removed its newly appointed foreign minister qin gangplaced him with his predecessor, wang yi. as a close associate of president xi jinping, mr qin was promoted quickly, but his removal — without an official explanation — continues to fuel speculations over what happened. i spoke with ianjohnson, a senior fellow on china studies at the council on foreign relations about what he makes of the speculations, which include both an affair and health reasons. i think it's almost in some ways, i guess it's not so important the sort of reasons it's more clearly he ran into some political difficulty. i think if you if you just got ill, then there would have been a forthright explanation of that and said there was a very terse one sentence statement saying that he'd been removed from office. the extramarital affair, i could believe it could be true, of course, but i would think that security officials would have known about this for a long time. i don't think at that level in chinese politics that there are too many secrets. so i think there must h

known for being tough, qin gang was previously ambassador to the u.s., and before that, the uk. he has not been seen publicly in a month. the last u.s. official to meet with him was secretary of state blinken in june multiple u.s. sources and chinese social media say he was brought down by a personal scandal reports not censored by the regime. meanwhile, china isn't making big decisions on when president xi will talk to president biden, how china will handle russia and the war in ukraine, and china's sagging economy. decisions not being made that could affect our pocketbooks here at home, depending on how this all plays out. lester >> okay, andrea mitchell, thank you. >>> now, to our nbc news exclusive rare access inside the u.s. mission to train troops fighting on the newest front in the the war on terror in west africa. we get more from courtney kube. >> reporter: tonight, we're on the front lines of a growing terror threat. these special ops soldiers in the west african country niger trained by u.s. troops, practicing door-to-door clearing operations, preparing for a fight ag

it won't matter that much. style because qin gang is out.ch won't matter that much. thank you very much indeed _ won't matter that much. thank you very much indeed for— won't matter that much. thank you very much indeed for that - won't matter that much. thank you very much indeed for that one. - won't matter that much. thank you | very much indeed for that one. one to watch. have you ever applied for a job you thought you might have a chance of getting, only to find you didn't even get to interview stage. increasingly it is al that is doing the sifting. but there are some clever people out there who have hacked the system. it is called — white fonting. the concept is pretty simple — the candidate will copy a long list of keywords relevant to thatjob desciption into their resume but then change the font colour to white invisible to the human eye. the ai bots pick up the white text and surface the resume to the top for human review. live now to speak to jason walker, co—founder and managing director thrive hr consulting. did i explain that ri

as you mentioned qin gang was last seen just about one month ago.meeting with officials in vietnam, from sri lanka, from russia. and then suddenly began to disappear from the public spotlight. in fact, he missed some very crucial meetings on the global stage including a meeting with an eu official. he was not seen when u.s. treasury secretary janet yellen came to china, as well as john kerry. and that has now prompted all of this conversation as to what happened. it was on tuesday afternoon in fact, jim that a government official, a spokesperson was actually asked where is he? what's happening here? and the official line was no information to provide. and then hours later, we saw the announcement of this departure of this demotion. as to what prompted it, again, no dominant moment or story line seems to surface. but that, again, is part of the intrigue here, as we observe what's happening right now in china, jim. >> speaking of intrigue, you're seeing him now expunged from all official websites as well there. some air brushing officially. marc stewa

chinese state media are reporting that the country's foreign minister qin gang has been removed fromseven months on the job. he has not been seen in public for a month. a statement mentioning an apparent health problem has since been wiped from the record. an official statement named china's top diplomat, wang yi, as his replacement. 0ur china correspondent stephen mcdonell sent this update from beijing. this is, of course, absolutely massive news in china and yet in typical fashion it came in such a muted way with just a few sentences read out on the evening television news bulletin that the foreign minister qin gang was to be removed from his post and replaced by the communist party's seniorforeign affairs official, wang yi, someone who has done thejob before. for the chinese people that is all they get and i suppose it is for them to accept it. that is the idea. the government made a decision, this is your foreign minister, he is gone, no more explanation as to why. the interesting thing, though, is how somebody who was seen as being so close to xi jinping, who was appointed by xi

doesn't feel the need to explain itself to the general public and the announcement simply came that qin gangeather over the next few days is going to remain fairly unsettled, with rain or showers and windy by the time we get to the weekend. today is no exception to that. sunny spells and scattered showers sums it up quite nicely. the showers particularly heavy across parts of scotland and later north—east england, but they are quite well scattered, we won't all catch one, and in between them there will be some sunshine. temperatures this afternoon ranging from 13 in the north to 21 in the south, so just a little bit below average for the time of year. as we head on through the evening and overnight, there still will be some showers. if anything, our weather front sinking south will pep up across the north coast of northern ireland, south—west scotland and also northern england. on either side of that, we're looking at some clear skies. it will be chilly in sheltered glens. overnight lows here three or four degrees, but in our towns and cities we're looking at between seven and 12 degrees. th

qin gang's mysterious removal does not suggest a positive answer..com/fareed for a link to my washington post column this week and let's get started. ♪ ♪ >>> israel finds itself embroiled in deep political crisis days after the parliament passed the first major step in prime minister's netanyahu judicial overhaul. this part of the legislation eliminated the israeli supreme court's power to block government actions that the court deems unreasonable. the controversial move drove crowds of israelis back into the streets in protest upon the white house weighed in, as well, saying the move was unfortunate. to understand the complexities of israel and the middle east, who better to ask than "the new york times" kohl am nift tom friedman who won two pillulitze prizes reporting from the region. welcome, tom. it feels like a small step, but it is a part of a series of moves planned to curtail the supreme court's power and why are they trying to do that? why is this narrow majority trying to do that? >> so being fareed, you have to start with a political come

xi jinping basically took qin gang, guided him up through the rairngs gave him the number two diplomat, who was at the washington wizards gang trying to do a three-point shot and on cnn the next minute blasting the united states and nancy pelosi saying china might take military action he is a true definition of a wolf warrior. has been in the post for quite a long time. especially xi jinping with this third presidential term. he put people in place who were going to be the people that he can trust, the people that he handpicked to lead china and basically xi jinping, the whole system is centered around him. and so the fact that somebody that was so close to him is now out in such a dramatic and abrupt and seci secretive mannet because of china' opaque political system we have no idea. and he has an even higher title, title of state counselor, that wasn't taken away from him. he hasn't been completely purged but certainly purged from the ministry of foreign affairs there could be more to come. we don't know because it's china. >> you know what's so fascinating about this, every mention

will, we look at this, qin gang was single handedly pulled up the ranks by xi, so this looks bad forg, is they have no information. how unusual is this? >> well, this is china, erica. this is a nebulous black box, especially when it comes to their law and order, their investigative process. and when you're talking about senior officials in the communist party, well, the secrecy is even more intense, which is why there has been such rampant speculation in china about where qin gang might be. he's the second highest diplomat in the country after wang yi. he was promoted to foreign minister last year. he works as chinese ambassador to the u.s. a lot of people in washington know him well. he was a trusted aide of chinese leader xi jinping. and he even met with antony blinken in june. it was on june 25th that he vanished. and ever since then, they have really been wondering what could have happened? did he run afoul with xi jinping? did something happened to cause him to be disappeared, like so many chinese officials in the past. >> you mentioned that speculation, what can you tell us abo

state media in china say qin gang has been removed from his post as foreign minister.s had blamed health problems for his disappearance. but speculation on social media has suggested that he has been having an affair with a television presenter. an official statement named china's top diplomat, wang yi, as his replacement. 0ur china correspondent stephen mcdonell sent this update from beijing. well, this is absolutely enormous news in china. qin gang, one of the most visible figures in this government, the foreign minister, has been removed from office, and replaced by wang yi, the communist party's senior foreign affairs official, someone who has done the job, by the way, before, of foreign minister, but i say it is enormous news, however, it was delivered with very little fanfare, just a couple of lines from the wire service which were read out on the 7pm evening news bulletin, just a couple of sentences, no explanation, but you know, previously, about sort of a month ago, when he disappeared from his normal duties, the official reason given was health concerns, some

qin gang should be there. that's his predecessor in the hallways. speculation has really started getting quite deep. they have been rumors and reports on social media. the times of london have actually talked about is not necessarily health reasons or it could be something more than health issues. there have been rumors. i'm not going to be a rumormongering but there's been rumors of extramarital affairs and we have also known that other officials at the top echelons -- keep in mind, he is in the central committee of the communist party of china. he's a senior leader even though he's relatively young at 57. and again, when people like this go missing, if you will, in china, with very little explanation from officials, often times, and it can be related to disciplinary actions. we don't know. i'm not going to get ahead of myself other than the fact, for 24 days, he has been out of public and there's lots of speculation. a very important quote. he is the former editor-in-chief of the very much estate backed global times, a hawk on national policy issu

qin gang had disappeared from public view almost a month ago.nese foreign ministry has issued no comment on his removal. russia has rejected new calls from the united nations to reinstate the black sea grain deal. moscow pulled out of the agreement last week, cutting off exports of food products from ukraine. in brussels today, european union officials discussed how to ship the grain to nations that rely heavily on it. >> the decision on the part of russia, not only the invasion of ukraine which was illegal and unjustified, but this action that sees once again, on the part of russia, the use of food as a weapon of war, is absolutely intolerable. the consequences of the closure of the black sea route a few days ago pose a problem for the output of grain from ukraine, but also for international rkets. william: separately, the u.n.'s nuclear watchdog reported land mines have now been spotted around the zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in southern ukraine. the site has been under russian control since shortly after the war began. back in this country, ups

china has removed its foreign minister qin gang, seen here on the right, less than seven months after the 57—year—old's last known public engagements were a month ago, fuelling speculation about his disappearance. the government has announced its delaying plans to introduce new recycling regulations by a year until october 2025. under the plans, retailers selling own—brand products would have to pay for their collection and recycling. critics warned the proposals could lead to higher prices for shoppers. kylian mbappe is the 2a—year—old captain of the french team paris saint germain — one of france's biggest stars. and the saudi arabian club al—hilal are after him. they have offered a world record transfer fee of £259 million for him. if he goes, he'll be following fellow stars ruben neves, kareem benzema and roberto firmino who have signed for saudi clubs this summer. 0ur correspondent dharshini david is here — why have they offered so much money? well, with money to burn, saudi arabia has been filling its trophy cabinet with the biggest stars. but how much would you pay for a goal?

>> lester,eign minister qin gang's firing is a huge embarrassment to president xi, according to formers who say xi had plucked him from relative obscurity for that post. he was known as a wolf diplomat for being tough and also ideological. xi was previously -- rather qin was previous ambassador and prior to that to the uk. he hasn't been seen for a month. last time officials met with him was secretary of state tony blinken in june. multiple sources and chinese social media say he was brought down by a personal scandal. reports not censored by the regime. meanwhile, china is not making any big decisions on when president xi will talk to president biden, how biden will handle russia and the war in ukraine and china's sagging economy, decisions not being made that could affect our pocketbooks here at home, depending on how this all plays out. lester? >> okay, andrea mitchell, thank you. >>> now to our nbc news exclusive. rare access inside the u.s. mission to train troops fighting on the newest front in the war on terror in west africa. let's get more from courtney kube. >> reporter: toni

chinese state media are reporting that the country's foreign minister, qin gang, has been removed fromss than seven months on the job. he has not been seen in public for a month. a statement mentioning an apparent health problem has since been wiped from the record. an official statement named china's top diplomat, wang yi, as his replacement. the us house of representatives�* select committee on china is looking into us investments in chinese technology companies. the committee sent letters to four us venture capital firms expressing concern over investments in artificial intelligence, quantam computing, and other advanced technologies. i spoke to the ranking member on the committee, democratic congressman raja krishnamoorthi, about the investigation earlier. great to have you with us in the studio. the house select committee on china has been looking into us venture capital firms who are investing in chinese tech, particularly in regards to ai. what are the investments that most concern you? investments that go into ai and quantum computing or semiconductors because what we found is

just a few sentences read out on the evening television news bulletin that the foreign minister qin gang removed from his post and replaced by the communist party's seniorforeign affairs official, wang yi, someone who has done thejob before. for the chinese people that is all they get and i suppose it is for them to accept it. that is the idea. the government made a decision, this is your foreign minister, he is gone, no more explanation as to why. the interesting thing, though, is how somebody who was seen as being so close to xi jinping, who was appointed by xi jinping only half a year ago could have so quickly been removed from this post. because of the opaque nature of governance here, all manners of questions are being asked about this. i mean, he disappeared and was not fronting up for his normal duties about a month ago and the official explanation was because of health reasons. but as the weeks went on and he was not reappearing, people started to speculate that maybe it is some sort of political punishment for him. 0nline the rumours started spreading about him having had an aff

qin gang was considered a rising star in politics and he's nowhere to be seen and no one can explainter: he was combative and controversial. >> we are fully justified to do what we must. >> reporter: polarizing, persuasive, performing under pressure, a patriotic poster child of china's wolf warrior diplomacy for an assertive new era and xi jinping, a meteoric rise making chin china's most powerful diplomat, darting around the world, welcoming allies to beijing. just last month antony blinken and his last known meeting with russia's deputy foreign minister. since then he's been missing for more than three weeks, absent from high-profile officials, janet yellen, john kerrey and most recently -- >> china saying he was unable to attend meetings due to health meetings but even that official explanations deleted from the chinese foreign ministery web site and it often leaves out content it deems sensitive from its transcript. his disappearance was not mentioned in china's state-controlled media, fueling intense speculation online. on chinese social media, one person asked we can't get what

. >> in march, china's new foreign minister, qin gang delivered a stern warning to the u.s.d that if washington does not change course in its stance towards china, conflict and confrontation is inevitable. this past august, when then speaker of the house nancy pelosi became the most senior u.s. political figure to visit taiwan in 25 years, china called it a blatant provocation. the people's liberation army fired ballistic missiles into the sea around taiwan and encircled the island with aircraft and war ships. >> are chinese war ships now operating closer to taiwan after nancy pelosi's visit? >> yes. >> the best guess anyone has about china's ultimate intentions for taiwan comes from the cia. according to its intelligence assessment, china's president, xi jin-ping, has ordered the people's liberation army to be prepared to take back the island by force by 2027. >> if china invades taiwan, what will the u.s. navy do? >> it's the decision of the president of the united states and the decision of the congress. it's our duty to be ready for that, but the bulk of the united state

well, fast forward several hours and about just within the last hour we learned that qin gang has been this is a very high profile job. this is the man who rebuked the united states and made strong comments after the incident involving the spy balloon and the shootdown and the response. this is a man who has also served as ambassador to the united states. very visible yet suddenly out of the public view. he's the person who helped facilitate some of the recent conversations with secretary of state anthony blinken. when there are key visits by u.s. officials, such as secretary of treasury janet yellen as well as john kerry, he was out of public view. so, as to what happened, no clear narrative at this point. but, this is a very bold change in the foreign policy force, if you will, for china, erica. >> yeah, certainly is. mark stewart, appreciate it. good to see you this morning. >>> stock is doing well. dow hit its longest winning streak in six years after it closed higher yesterday. the rally comes as federal reserve kicks off two day meeting. they expect the fed will raise rates once

why he was qin gang's predecessor we have not gotten a n explanation.e do not know what transpired. we may in the days or weeks get more information. if there were officials who were under investigation, and we have no indication that is what happened yet, but if there were in the past such officials, there have been announcements. if there was health reasons, we had the foreign minister earlier saying there was a physical condition that kept him from attending the meeting in indonesia. if there was a health issue, we may get an announcement of that. unfortunately, there is no guarantee that beijing will be forthcoming with more details. there is no guarantee we will ever find out exactly what happened. shery: we have gone back to the former foreign minister now again predecessor wang yi taking the helm. perhaps more continuity in geopolitics. what about continuity in geopolitics, given we have the governor of the central bank. >> there is a theme developing with these changes in personnel and that is continuity. obviously, economics, china finds itself