A month after a scandal involving the international community came to light, China is still scrambling to put out the fire. It all started on November 2, when Chinese women&#8217;s tennis star Peng Shuai, 35, accused former Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli, 75, of forcing her to have sexual relations with him on the Chinese version of Twitter, Weibo. This is how it all began.
On November 21, about three weeks after his disappearance, the situation took an unexpected turn when IOC President Thomas Bach suddenly announced that he had held online talks with General Peng and confirmed that he was safe. International journalist Toshihiro Yamada says.
<figure id="attachment_218851" class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 2319px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-218851"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="dba2898f"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2021/12/e23643e5a1096cc6d8ca4546248f208e.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-218851" class="wp-caption-text">Former Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli (bottom) and President Xi Jinping (top) attend the Chinese Communist Party Congress in October &#8217;17. Mr. Zhang played a central role in the bid for the Beijing Olympics.</figcaption></figure>
 It all started when Western countries and the Women&#8217;s Tennis Association (WTA), who questioned Peng&#8217;s safety, saying that she was being watched by the Chinese government, harshly denounced the Chinese government and announced that they would consider a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Olympics to be held next February. It was President Bach who turned his attention to dodge the criticism.
 He was so fond of China that he mistakenly referred to the Japanese as &#8220;Chinese people&#8221; at a press conference for the Tokyo Olympics. About 75% of the IOC&#8217;s operating expenses are broadcasting rights fees. It was a conflict of interest. By having President Bach hold an online meeting with General Peng, they were able to appeal to the outside world that General Peng was safe, and they worked together to hold the Olympics.
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Is she safe in the first place? What the hell is going on in China? A former senior official of China&#8217;s state-run media said, &#8220;There is a mastermind within the Communist Party behind the accusations against Peng Shuang.
 The accusations against Peng Marshal are merely a byproduct of the power struggle within the Communist Party. She was used as a pawn in the struggle to unseat Zhang.
According to this former official, it is extremely unnatural that the current situation of the accused Zhang has not been reported at all even within China. According to this former official, it is extremely unnatural that the current situation of the accused, Mr. Zhang, has not been reported even within China, because under the Xi Jinping regime, which is strict on corruption and scandals, punishment is publicized as an example. The fact that they haven&#8217;t is most likely due to unfavorable facts on the part of the authorities,&#8221; the former official continued.
Some say that the accusations were part of the #MeToo movement, a worldwide movement to eradicate sexual harassment, but this is the thinking of someone who doesn&#8217;t understand China. But this is the thinking of someone who doesn&#8217;t understand China, because there is no way that Peng Shuang doesn&#8217;t know the horrors of the Communist Party&#8217;s control. If she was serious about pressing charges, she would have taken out insurance, such as moving abroad with her family. If she were serious about pressing charges, she would have moved abroad with her family and taken out some kind of insurance, so that the crackdown would extend to her relatives. She has made a name for herself as a tennis player, so there is no way she would take a risk without insurance.
The reason the accusation was posted on Weibo was because &#8220;the censorship system was temporarily lifted,&#8221; he said.
 The fact that the accusation was posted on Weibo in the first place is strange. In China, the mere presence of the name of a member of the Central Bureau of Political Affairs is enough for the server to reject it before it is posted and send it to the checking section. But somehow, General Peng&#8217;s accusation escaped state censorship and was released for 30 minutes. This would not have happened if someone in authority had not deliberately made it go through for a certain purpose.
For what purpose are they trying to disqualify Mr. Zhang? A CCP official said that the focus is on the &#8220;oil interests&#8221; that Mr. Zhang is holding.
 Zhang was close to Zhou Yongkang, the former secretary of the party&#8217;s Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission. Zhang was close to Zhou Yongkang, the former secretary of the party&#8217;s Central Committee for Political and Legal Affairs, who controlled the &#8220;oil conglomerate&#8221; consisting of three major companies that produced domestic oil. After Mr. Zhou was disqualified for corruption in 2002, Mr. Zhang took over the oil concession. The real purpose of the accusation is to use the sex scandal to keep those interests in the air.
 There is a strong possibility that it was Xi Jinping who orchestrated this. He has been stealing water and power concessions from his political opponents. It is also possible that this is the work of the Shanghai clique, an anti-Xi Jinping faction within the party, but in any case, it is definitely a power struggle within the Communist Party over money.
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Was the scandal, which developed into an international problem, only a power struggle over money in the narrow world of the Communist Party? &#8230;&#8230;
<figure id="attachment_218849" class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 2786px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-218849"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="155e4760"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2021/12/b253ef4ffe81dba6b6b35975d4f17e0d.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-218849" class="wp-caption-text">A selfie of General Peng taken by a Chinese state media official on November 20. There are many puzzling points, such as the fact that Winnie the Pooh, a symbol of ridicule of Xi Jinping, slipped through state censorship to appear in the photo.</figcaption></figure>
<figure id="attachment_218850" class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 4101px;" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-218850"><a href="#" data-ident_hash="0448fd32"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/fridaydigital/image/private/t_article_image/wpmedia/2021/12/217ea719ef97a9c617d6ac03d2d29521.jpg" alt=""></a><figcaption id="caption-attachment-218850" class="wp-caption-text">On November 21, it was announced that President Bach had an online meeting with General Peng. Suspicions were aroused that Chinese money was flowing.</figcaption></figure>
From &#8220;FRIDAY&#8221; December 17, 2021 issue

 Kyodo News (1st photo)

 It has been a month since the scandal involving the international community came to light. On November 2, on the Chinese version of Twitter, "Weibo," Chinese women's tennis star Peng Shuai, 35

 Chinese man" even mobilized IOC President Bach to testify about the staggering truth behind the international scandal, according to a former Chinese state media executive.

Power struggle within the Chinese Communist Party” behind the disappearance of a women’s tennis star

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