Old photos of China's President Xi Jinping shared to claim he recently 'suffered a stroke'

What is the claim?

Multiple social media users are posting photos of Chinese President Xi Jinping grimacing, claiming they show the leader suffering a stroke during a recently concluded meeting of the Chinese Communist Party in July 2024.

The photos are being shared across X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook, with one X post amassing more than 2,400,000 views and over 7,600 likes. This post is captioned, "UNCONFIRMED — XI JINPING REPORTEDLY SUFFERS STROKE. Social media in China is abuzz with news that President Xi suffered a stroke during a CCP meeting. Although there is no official confirmation yet, the viral news has caused significant unrest. Sources: Local Media." The archives of these posts are here, here, and here.

Screenshots from similar claims circulating on social media (Source: Facebook/X/ Modified by Logically Facts)

As of July 19, 2024, there are no credible reports confirming the rumors of the Chinese president suffering a stroke during the third plenary session of the 20th Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, which was held from July 15 to 18 in Beijing.

We found that the photograph circulating on social media is not recent but from the closing session of the National People's Congress held in Beijing, China, in March 2024. Further, the image does not capture the Chinese president suffering a stroke.

What are the facts?

Upon conducting a reverse image search, we found that several news outlets had published similar images of Xi Jinping grimacing in March 2024. These reports stated the photos were taken at the closing session of the National People's Congress held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11, 2024.

One of the photos, depicting Jinping drinking from a white cup, was taken by a Reuters photojournalist, Tingshu Wang, at a similar meeting on March 11, 2024. "Chinese President Xi Jinping drinks from a cup at the closing session of the National People's Congress (NPC) at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China March 11, 2024," the caption of the photo read.

The picture from Reuters depicting Chinese President Xi Jinping drinking from a cup at NPC held in Beijing (Source: Reuters/Tingshu Wang)

Other photographs of the session, taken 12 minutes later by Reuters, show the Chinese president standing up and clapping as usual.

The other viral photograph, showing Jinping seemingly wincing after drinking from his teacup, can also be found on the Associated Press (AP) website. Its caption is "Chinese President Xi Jinping, rear, reacts after drinking from a cup at the closing session of the National People's Congress held at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, Monday, March 11, 2024." 

Also, other photographs of the session taken by the AP moments after this, as indicated by the timestamps on the pictures, depict Xi standing up and behaving as usual.

We found no evidence of credible reports from March 2024 that stated anything about the Chinese president suffering a stroke at the time.

The verdict

The viral images circulating on social media, purportedly depicting China's President Xi Jinping having a stroke, are misleading. The photographs were taken at the closing session of the National People's Congress held in Beijing, China, in March 2024. Further, there are no official statements about Jinping having suffered a stroke recently.