China's Xi mourns Liu Yandong, rare woman official among country's Communist elite
Former Chinese vice-premier Liu Yandong was one of the six women that have been a full member of the 25-member Politburo.
Chinese Vice-Premier Liu Yandong applauds during the closing session of the 2013 US-China High-Level Consultation on People-to-People Exchange at the Department of State in Washington DC on Nov 21, 2013. (File photo: AFP/Paul J Richards)
03 Nov 2026 07:19PM (Updated: 03 Nov 2026 07:21PM)
BEIJING: President Xi Jinping attended a "solemn" ceremony in Beijing on Tuesday (Nov 3) to mourn Liu Yandong, one of only a handful of women to have sat on the Chinese Communist Party's elite Politburo, state media reported.
Liu, a former vice-premier, died on Oct 28 "due to illness" in Beijing, according to state news agency Xinhua. She was 80.
In 2007, Liu ascended to the 25-member Politburo at China's 17th Party Congress.
She was one of six women that have been a full member of the top policymaking body, which today is all men.
She held that seat until 2017 when she retired from the Politburo, though she remained a vice-premier until 2018.
Liu graduated from Beijing’s prestigious Tsinghua University where she was associated with former Chinese leader Hu Jintao.
During her political career she oversaw health, education, science, culture and sport, as well as women's and children's issues.
Liu met then-US secretary of state Hillary Clinton multiple times, with the two embracing as they greeted one another in Washington in 2011.
"We are the two mothers," Clinton joked, referencing a proposal to expand exchanges between people of the two countries.
On Tuesday, the Xinhua report praised Liu as a "loyal Communist fighter". She was cremated the same day at the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery in Beijing.
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