Chen Yixin (; born 1 September 1959) is a Chinese politician who is the current Minister of State Security. Born in

Taishun County Taishun County () is a county in the prefecture-level city of Wenzhou, in the southern part of Zhejiang province, China, bordering Fujian province to the southeast, south, and west. Taishun County has more than 900 covered bridges, many of the ...

, Zhejiang, Chen gained political prominence working in his home province. In 2015, he was appointed as the deputy director of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms, working there until 2016. In 2017, he became the Communist Party Secretary of

Wuhan Wuhan; is the capital of Hubei, China. With a population of over eleven million, it is the most populous city in Hubei and the List of cities in China by population, eighth-most-populous city in China. It is also one of the nine National cent ...

, working in that capacity until 2018. In 2018, he was appointed as the Secretary-General of the

Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission The Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (CPLC), commonly referred to as ''Zhongyang Zhengfawei'' (, literally "Central Poli-Legal Commission") in Chinese, is the organization under the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Part ...

. As Secretary-General, Chen oversaw the Special Campaign to Crack Down on Organized Crime and Eliminate Evil from 2018 to 2020, and the campaign to educate and rectify the political and legal teams from 2020 to 2022. He was appointed as the Minister of State Security in 2022.

Early life and education

Chen was born in

, Zhejiang. He graduated with a degree in

physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...

from Lishui Teacher's College (now Lishui University), where he served as a leader in the school's Communist Youth League.

Political career

He has served as deputy Secretary-General of Zhejiang Party Committee. In 2012 he became party secretary of

Jinhua Jinhua is a prefecture-level city in central Zhejiang province in eastern China. It borders the provincial capital of Hangzhou to the northwest, Quzhou to the southwest, Lishui to the south, Taizhou, Zhejiang, Taizhou to the east, and Shaoxin ...

. On 3 January 2013, he became Communist Party Secretary of

Wenzhou Wenzhou; Chinese postal romanization, historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in China's Zhejiang province. Wenzhou is located at the extreme southeast of Zhejiang, bordering Lishui, Zhejiang, Lishui to the west, Taizhou, Zheji ...

, a post which he served until 1 December 2015. Between December 2014 and December 2015, Chen was also a member of the Zhejiang Communist Party Standing Committee. Chen later became the deputy director of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms in 2015 until 2016. On 26 June 2017, Chen was appointed as the Communist Party Secretary of

, a position he held until 20 March 2018, as well as deputy party secretary of

Hubei Hubei is a province of China, province in Central China. It has the List of Chinese provincial-level divisions by GDP, seventh-largest economy among Chinese provinces, the second-largest within Central China, and the third-largest among inland ...

Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission

In March 2018, Chen Yixin succeeded Wang Yongqing as the Secretary-General of the

(CPLAC). Starting from May 2018, became the secretary-general of the National Leading Group of the Special Campaign to Crack Down on Organized Crime and Eliminate Evil. In August 2018, Chen Yixin presided over the second meeting of the Leading Group, where he said the campaign would enter a more difficult period and called for strengthening cooperation between the CCDI and legal organizations. In February 2020, Chen was announced to be the deputy head of the central government's directing group on Hubei, leading efforts related to the COVID-19 pandemic in the province, assisting Vice Premier Sun Chunlan. On 8 July 2020, Chen announced a two-year campaign to educate and rectify the political and legal teams to purge "corrupt elements" in the justice system and remove "two-faced officials", who only pay lip service to CCP orders and rules. Calling it a "a self-initiated revolution by the security system", he compared the campaign to Mao Zedong's

Yan'an Rectification Movement The Yan'an Rectification Movement ( zh, s=延安整风运动, t=延安整風運動, p=Yán'ān Zhěngfēng Yùndòng) was a political mass movement led by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1942 to 1945. The movement took place in the Ya ...

. The campaign was announced to initially start with a three-month pilot scheme in five cities and four counties in Heilongjiang, Jiangsu, Shaanxi, Sichuan and Henan, and go nationwide in 2021, lasting until the first quarter of 2022.

Minister of State Security

On 30 October 2022, Chen was officially appointed by the

Standing Committee of the National People's Congress The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPCSC) is the permanent body of the National People's Congress (NPC), the national legislature of the People's Republic of China. It exercises the powers of the NPC when it is not in s ...

as the minister of state security, succeeding Chen Wenqing. He was succeeded by Yin Bai as the Secretary-General of the CPLAC in March 2023. Under Chen's tenure, the long-secretive Ministry of State Security (MSS) opened a

WeChat WeChat or Weixin in Chinese ( zh, c=微信, p=Wēixìn , l=micro-message) is an instant messaging, social media, and mobile payment mobile app, app developed by Tencent. First released in 2011, it became the world's largest standalone mobile a ...

account in July 2023. In the first anniversary of the account, Chen called the social media work of the MSS as being a "project of paramount importance", and said that officials must be "good at transforming the mysterious, miraculous and divine nature of national-security work into strengths in communication, penetration and influence".

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chen, Yixin Ministers of state security of the People's Republic of China 1959 births Living people People's Republic of China politicians from Zhejiang Chinese Communist Party politicians from Zhejiang Politicians from Wenzhou Alternates of the 19th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party Members of the 20th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party