But Xi's policies are only creating the hostile world he claims he is defending against, believes Susan Shirk, a China expert in former US president Bill Clinton's administration. Fear and loyalty has led to "over-compliance and over-implementation of what Xi himself originally wanted", Ms Shirk says. But they never made it this far. Twenty miles on, a rusty watermelon monument marks the tide mark of Moscow's advance. irannews.ru/ - irannews.ru In 2005 I was handed a DVD smuggled out of a village called Dingzhou in Hebei province. It showed a pitched battle between local farmers and dozens of armed thugs, hired by a state-owned power company, to force them off their land. The farmers had dug deep trenches in their fields. The thugs attacked at dawn opening fire with shotguns and beating the farmers with steel bars. Six were killed. "I think the party elders must have had a touch of buyer's remorse," Mr McGregor says. He saw Mordaunt this morning and said she was “very chipper” and “in the zone”. Mao's mantle eventually fell to Deng Xiaoping, who had survived two purges, and insisted on collective leadership that would change every 10 years. "An uncontested election of Rishi Sunak today would reinforce the return of market credibility and show the Tories have rediscovered a will to win," he says.