BEIJING — China is opening a twice-a-decade party conference at which leader Xi Jinping is expected to receive a third five-year term that breaks with recent precedent and establishes himself as possibly the most powerful Chinese politician since Mao Zedong.
Xi is expected to issue a lengthy address at an opening session Sunday but little change is foreseen in his formula of strict one-party rule, intolerance of criticism and a hard-line approach toward COVID-19.
At a news conference, the congress' spokesperson reaffirmed the commitment to the "zero-COVID" policy despite the economic costs and repeated threats to use force to annex self-governing Taiwan.
An observer says Xi faces no open opposition but his concentration of power has rankled the public and party officials.
