(VOVWORLD) - Chinese state media reports that Jiang Zemin, former head of the Chinese Party and State, died in Shanghai on Wednesday afternoon due to an illness.
Xinhua News Agency’s website and major Chinese newspapers turned black and white after the announcement.
Xinhua said the passing was announced in a letter addressing the whole Party, the entire military and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups. His death came after all medical treatments failed, it said.
Xinhua News Agency quoted the letter as saying: “Comrade Jiang Zemin was an outstanding leader, a great Marxist, a great proletarian revolutionary, statesman, military strategist and diplomat, a long-tested communist fighter, and an outstanding leader of the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics.”