Where is China's foreign minister? Beijing's not saying.

China’s tough-talking foreign minister — in office for just over six months — has been absent from the public eye for more than three weeks despite a flurry of diplomatic activity in Beijing, triggering intense speculation over the reason for his unexplained disappearance.

Qin Gang, 57, is a seasoned and rapidly rising Chinese diplomatic star. He served as China’s ambassador to the U.S. for about a year and a half from July 2021, then was handed the foreign ministry portfolio last December and named a State Councilor — the third highest-ranking position in China’s central government — in March.

The concerns over Qin’s disappearance were initially addressed by Foreign Ministry officials a week ago, when it was announced that he would skip an annual Association of Southeast Asian Nations foreign ministers meeting in Indonesia due to “health reasons.” The ministry did not elaborate further, fueling public speculation that he had contracted COVID-19.

However, questions over his whereabouts have continued to mount since his prolonged absence grew longer than the time likely needed to recover from the virus.

Asked about Qin’s absence at a regular news briefing on Monday, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said she had “no information to provide,” adding that the country’s diplomatic activities were being carried out as usual.

As of Wednesday, Qin has been missing from public view for 24 days. His last public appearance was on June 25, when he met with diplomats from Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Russia.

Since then, Qin has failed to attend several high-profile meetings with diplomats from other countries, including senior U.S. officials such as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and climate envoy John Kerry. He was slated to meet European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell earlier this month, but that meeting was abruptly canceled by China.

Given the importance of Qin’s role in China’s diplomacy, Alfred Wu, of the National University of Singapore, said his disappearance is especially “unusual and problematic” for Beijing in that it comes amid a spate of diplomatic activities in China.

In particular, the disappearance does not bode well for already fraught Sino-U.S. ties, experts say.

“At a very sensitive time for U.S.-China relations, it is problematic for Chinese diplomacy not to have such a prominent figure clearly visible,” said Rana Mitter, a specialist on the history and politics of modern China at the University of Oxford.

Wu also noted that the opacity surrounding Qin’s whereabouts reflected a key structural issue with the Communist Party-ruled system of government — its tendency to create an information vacuum.

At a time when the world’s No. 2 economy is grappling with a slower-than-expected economic recovery while also trying to lure back investment after removing stringent COVID-19 rules, Wu said that the sudden and unexplained disappearance of a senior official, such as a foreign minister, will hamper attempts to restore international confidence.

“It runs counter to China’s image of promoting a business-friendly environment,” he said. “The business sector wants transparency, rule of law, or other kinds of rigorous structural systems to be in place.”

China’s Communist Party has long kept a tight lid on the status of senior officials’ personal lives and physical well-being. In one example, leader Xi Jinping’s COVID-19 vaccination status was only made public in July 2022, ending widespread questions over whether the top leadership had received homemade shots.

It is not uncommon in China for senior or regional officials to suddenly vanish from the public eye. Indeed, this practice has become commonplace under a large-scale anti-corruption campaign that has ensnared some of the Communist Party’s most powerful figures over the years.

This list includes the detention of Interpol chief Meng Hongwei in 2018, as well as the 2011 arrest of Wen Qingliang, the former head of the rail bureau in the city of Kunming, and the arrest of former Guangxi party chief Wang Zhongping this year. Many of these officials’ detentions were revealed by the party’s disciplinary watchdog only weeks after a probe was launched.

Before assuming office in 2012, Xi himself abruptly vanished from the public eye for two weeks, missing a meeting with then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in one of the most high-profile-yet-unexplained absences in recent history.

Any malfeasance on Qin’s part could also reflect poorly on Xi.

The foreign minister’s rapid rise is believed to have something to do with his close relationship with the Chinese leader. Qin helped organize conferences and planned overseas trips for Xi during two earlier stints as Foreign Ministry spokesman and chief protocol officer — which may have impressed Xi and contributed to his promotion.

In comparison, Wang Yi, Qin’s predecessor, spent five years as foreign minister before his elevation to State Councilor in 2018.

While officials’ prolonged absences are often linked to disciplinary violations, Oxford’s Mitter said business figures and celebrities in China also face the risk of forced disappearances.

“Former Alibaba chief Jack Ma disappeared for a longer period a couple of years ago, as did movie star Fan Bingbing, and in both cases, they only reappeared after being investigated and criticized,” said Mitter.

Ma, the founder of the e-commerce giant Alibaba, disappeared in late 2020 after he publicly criticized the government’s financial regulations. He was spotted physically in China this year, attending several offline events in his hometown Hangzhou and Tokyo. Movie star Fan Bingbing reappeared in 2019 after a one-year period of silence related to a fine for tax evasion.

Mitter said “it is rare” for public figures in China such as Qin to disappear for long periods, “but it often has a political meaning when they do.”

With China staying silent over Qin's whereabouts, one can only guess the reason for his continued absence.

“Qin Gang must have done something more severe than we can imagine, so he could be absent for a very long period of time,” Wu said.