Gao’s sin? Saying that China may have grown just 2% over the last two or three years, less than half the rate Xi’s government claims. The reason Gao is allegedly being silenced is for shining a brighter-than-usual spotlight on one of the biggest perception problems facing Xi’s Communist Party: that China routinely cooks the GDP books.

China's economic growth is likely to slow to 4.5% in 2025 and cool further to 4.2% in 2026, a Reuters poll showed, with policymakers poised to roll out fresh stimulus measures to soften the blow from impending U.

Note: no sound] A view of the loading and unloading operation area of the container terminal in Longtan Port Area of Nanjing Port, Jiangsu province, China,6, 2025. According to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on the same day,