Do we like Xi Jinping?
Our score: 2 out of 10. A long record of rights crackdowns under his rule, with one real climate pledge to set against it.
Xi was born in Beijing in 1953, the son of a senior Communist Party official. He rose through the party and began a third five-year term as party leader in October 2022, breaking with recent precedent that limited leaders to two terms. In 2018 China's legislature had already removed the two-term limit on the presidency.
The two biggest stains are Xinjiang and Hong Kong. A UN human rights office report in 2022 found that the detention of Uyghurs and other mostly Muslim groups may amount to crimes against humanity, and cited credible allegations of torture. Beijing called the findings based on lies by anti-China forces and published its own report defending its counterterrorism record. In Hong Kong, a national security law imposed in 2020 curbed dissent after the 2019 protests.
On the harm test, Human Rights Watch says his government has amassed an increasingly disastrous human rights record. It reports that Xi has pushed ideological conformity and loyalty to himself and the party. HRW also reports jailed Hong Kong democracy leaders and relatives of overseas critics being targeted. The reports we read don't quote Xi directly on LGBTQ+ people or women, so we won't put words in his mouth there. The pattern of shrinking space for dissent is documented, though Beijing disputes these characterisations.
The recent stuff is mostly geopolitics. In January 2026 he called reunification with Taiwan unstoppable, a day after China ended live-fire drills simulating a blockade of the island. At the May summit, Chinese state media said he warned Trump of possible clashes and even conflicts if Taiwan wasn't handled properly. Trump claimed fantastic trade deals, but analysts saw little concrete.
At home, he has run a sweeping military purge. In March 2026 he told delegates there must be no one in the military who harbours disloyalty to the party, and nine officers were dismissed that week. The party calls it an anti-corruption drive, while analysts quoted by AP say it also helps remove potential rivals.
The good stuff is thin but real. In 2021 he told the UN that China would not build new coal-fired power projects abroad, and repeated pledges to peak emissions before 2030 and reach carbon neutrality before 2060. Climate campaigners welcomed the overseas coal move, though experts said China's wider targets weren't ambitious enough and it still leans heavily on coal at home.