Guo Tao, the police chief of Zhanjiang, has been placed under investigation. He is a former subordinate of Liu Guozhou, head of the Guangdong provincial public security department, and Liu in turn spent six years working under Wang Xiaohong and was promoted by him. Over the past year or two, a number of Wang Xiaohong’s close associates have been moved out of the Ministry of Public Security.
Guo Tao falls, a former subordinate of Liu Guozhou
On Aug. 25, 2026, the website of the CCP’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Supervisory Commission, citing the Guangdong provincial discipline inspection commission, announced that Guo Tao, deputy mayor of Zhanjiang and director of the municipal public security bureau, was under investigation on suspicion of serious violations of party discipline and the law. His biography has since been taken down from the Zhanjiang public security bureau website.
Public records show that Guo Tao is 54 and comes from Guiyang, Guizhou province. He has served as deputy mayor of Zhanjiang, as party secretary, director and chief inspector of the Zhanjiang public security bureau, and as first deputy secretary of the Zhanjiang municipal political and legal affairs commission.
Guo is reported to have been a subordinate of Liu Guozhou, the incumbent head of the Guangdong provincial public security department, during Liu’s time as Shenzhen police chief. Between July 2020 and July 2023, while Liu held that post, Guo rose from deputy head of the criminal investigation detachment of the Shenzhen public security bureau to head of the detention administration detachment and then to head of the bureau’s public order administration division.
In December 2023, Liu Guozhou was promoted to vice governor of Guangdong and concurrently party secretary and director of the provincial public security department. In January 2024, Guo Tao was promoted again, to deputy mayor of Zhanjiang and party secretary and director of its public security bureau.
For the best of our weekly content！
You are now signed up for our newsletter
Check your email to complete sign up
Public records show that Liu Guozhou is 54 and comes from Xingtai, Hebei province. He served for many years in the Beijing police system and is a former subordinate of Wang Xiaohong.
Liu Guozhou served under Wang Xiaohong in Beijing
Wang Xiaohong was head of the Beijing public security bureau from March 2015 to April 2020. In June 2017, Liu Guozhou became deputy head of the Xicheng district government in Beijing and party secretary and director of the bureau’s Xicheng branch. In July 2019, he became a member of the party committee and a deputy director of the Beijing public security bureau.
Wang Xiaohong served as executive vice minister of public security from March 2018 to June 2022. In July 2020, Liu Guozhou became deputy mayor of Shenzhen and party secretary and director of its public security bureau.
Wang Xiaohong became minister of public security on June 24, 2022. In July 2023, Liu Guozhou became party secretary and director of the Guangdong provincial public security department.
The sequence shows Liu Guozhou serving under Wang Xiaohong for six years and being promoted throughout.
During his service in the Shenzhen and Zhanjiang public security bureaus, Guo Tao was repeatedly named a principal perpetrator, and made the subject of investigation, by the overseas World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong for persecuting Falun Gong practitioners.
Liu Guozhou was likewise repeatedly named a principal perpetrator, and made the subject of investigation, by the same organization for persecuting Falun Gong practitioners during his service in the Beijing and Shenzhen public security bureaus and the Guangdong provincial public security department.
Several of Wang Xiaohong’s confidants have been moved out of the ministry
Wang Xiaohong is an important confidant of CCP leader Xi Jinping from Xi’s years in Fujian. After Xi came to power, Wang was promoted to minister of public security. Since 2025, however, a series of Wang’s former subordinates have been transferred out of the ministry.
On July 16, 2026, a list of appointments and removals issued by the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security under the CCP’s State Council showed Tan Quan removed as assistant minister of public security. Tan was a former subordinate of Wang Xiaohong and now serves as vice mayor of Chongqing and head of the Chongqing public security bureau.
On June 26, 2026, Yue Xiuhu, a vice-ministerial-level counterterrorism commissioner at the Ministry of Public Security, was transferred to become a deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission. In July 2025, vice ministers Chen Siyuan and Sun Maoli were removed. In May of that year, Hu Bincheng, assistant minister and director of the ministry’s general office, was transferred to become vice governor of Jiangsu and head of its public security department. In April 2025, Xu Ganlu was removed as vice minister and head of the National Immigration Administration, also known as the National Immigration Bureau; he now serves as a deputy chairman of the foreign affairs committee of the 14th National People’s Congress and president of the Chinese Police Association.
Yue Xiuhu, Chen Siyuan, Sun Maoli, Hu Bincheng, Xu Ganlu and Tan Quan are all close associates and former subordinates of Wang Xiaohong.
Separately, on July 16, 2026, the Sichuan state outlet Chuanguan News reported that, according to the Sichuan provincial funeral working group for Huang Ruixue, Huang had “passed away unfortunately” at 8:30 p.m. on July 15, aged 54, after emergency treatment failed following a “sudden illness.” The X user “Vincent” posted a claim that Huang Ruixue, vice governor of Sichuan and head of the provincial public security department, had returned to Chengdu from a national symposium of provincial and municipal police chiefs and hanged himself in his office the previous night. One X user commented that if that were true, the senior figure being protected would have to see to his family.
CCP party media reported that the national symposium of provincial and municipal police chiefs was held in Nanjing, Jiangsu, on July 14 and 15, 2026, and that Wang Xiaohong, a member of the CCP Secretariat and minister of public security, attended and delivered a speech. Huang Ruixue attended the meeting that day.
The Hong Kong newspaper Ming Pao reported that when Chinese officialdom uses the phrase “passed away unfortunately” in an obituary, it generally indicates that the official did not die a natural death. Earlier, Zhang Ping, a US-based commentator, told Vision Times that Huang Ruixue’s death was in no sense a natural one and that it reflected the intensity of the political struggle inside the CCP. He added that if the widely circulated account is right that Huang killed himself in his office on the night of Wang Xiaohong’s meeting, then the questions of what happened at that meeting, and what it had to do with Huang’s death, are ones the CCP cannot avoid.
Original article
Comments