Song Ping, veteran Chinese Communist, dies aged 108 after career that spanned decades

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AdvertisementChina’s Communist PartyChinaPoliticsBreaking | Song Ping, veteran Chinese Communist, dies aged 108 after career that spanned decades

Song worked with several generations of leaders, starting as Zhou Enlai’s secretary and later talent-spotted future president Hu Jintao

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Former Standing Committee member and Community Party elder Song Ping (centre) attends the Communist Party’s national congress in Beijing in 2022. Photo: AP

Josephine Ma

Song Ping, a veteran Chinese revolutionary who lived through five generations of Communist Party leaders, has died at the age of 108.

He died at 3.36pm in Beijing on Wednesday, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Song’s career began in the 1930s before the founding of the People’s Republic including a spell as political secretary to the future premier Zhou Enlai.

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Song held many important positions during the following decades and his career peaked when he became a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, the top decision-making body, in 1989. He retired in 1992 at the age of 75.

Song Ping (left) and former vice-president Zeng Qinghong at the opening Communist Party’s national congress in Beijing in October, 2022. Photo: Kyodo
Song Ping (left) and former vice-president Zeng Qinghong at the opening Communist Party’s national congress in Beijing in October, 2022. Photo: Kyodo

Born in April 1917 in Ju county, Shandong province, Song joined the Communist Party at the age of 19 in 1937.

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