JIANG ZEMIN passed away due to leukemia and multiple organ failure in Shanghai at 12:13 p.m. yesterday, at the age of 96, it was announced.

The announcement was made by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the State Council of the PRC, the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, and the Central Military Commissions of the CPC and the PRC.

It was announced in a letter addressing the whole Party, the entire military and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups.

The letter says they proclaim with profound grief to the whole Party, the entire military and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups that our beloved Comrade Jiang Zemin died of leukemia and multiple organ failure after all medical treatments had failed.

The letter says that Comrade Jiang Zemin was an outstanding leader enjoying high prestige acknowledged by the whole Party, the entire military and the Chinese people of all ethnic groups, 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. He was the core of the CPC’s third generation of central collective leadership and the principal founder of the Theory of Three Represents.

(Xinhua)