As Rumors Spread, China Declares ‘No Great Change’ in Deng’s Health

The Chinese government, attempting to quell rampant rumors about the failing health of senior leader Deng Xiaoping that sent stock markets reeling, declared Tuesday that there was “no great change” in the 92-year-old’s condition.

“There has been no great change in Comrade Deng Xiaoping’s health situation,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Tang Guoqiang said. “I have no new information to provide.”

The latest round of speculation about Deng’s health began over the weekend when a Hong Kong newspaper reported that the ailing leader, last seen in public in 1994, had suffered a stroke and was near death in a military hospital.

By Tuesday, rumors about Deng’s condition had snowballed to the point that stock markets in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan all showed precipitous declines. The bulk of trading in China’s two main markets, Shanghai and Shenzhen, was automatically halted early Tuesday afternoon after most shares declined the maximum 10% permitted under China’s securities laws.

“My broker called me at noon and told me the market was going to fall because Deng was going to die,” said one nervous stock trader.

But Western diplomats in the capital reported seeing no signs that the senior leader’s condition had taken a turn for the worse.

“Our sources tell us that he is as well as he has been, maybe only slightly worse,” commented one diplomat. “It’s still too early for the black armbands.”

Security appeared normal around the Zhongnanhai leadership compound, Beijing’s central Tiananmen Square and the 301 Military Hospital, where Deng is reported to be receiving care.

“In our survey of key places in the city, we saw no unusual activity,” commented another diplomat.

Two senior officials, Vice Premier Li Lanqing, traveling in Israel, and Defense Minister Chi Haotian, meeting with military leaders in the Philippines, announced that they would continue their overseas travel. If Deng was near death, diplomats here speculated, the two leaders would probably be summoned home.

In another sign of normalcy, U.S. Ambassador James R. Sasser met as scheduled with Premier Li Peng to discuss the upcoming visit to China by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

In Hong Kong, the territory’s designated chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, said he was coming to Beijing as planned today to present his proposed new Cabinet to the Chinese leadership. An aide to Tung, who will become Hong Kong’s top authority when the colony reverts to Chinese sovereignty in July, said he called Beijing on Monday and was informed that Deng’s condition was “stable.”

In its main evening newscast Tuesday night, China Central Television made no mention of Deng’s health. But the news program devoted a long segment to the publication of the second volume of “Deng Xiaoping’s Economic Theory.”

Meanwhile, the official New China News Agency reported that Deng was well enough to send a letter of condolence to the family of another senior Communist official, former Defense Minister Qin Jiwei, who died Feb. 2.