Maintaining and securing national unity: Xi’s second core interest is the unity and territorial integrity of the motherland. Maintaining firm control over Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Hong Kong is nonnegotiable for the CCP. Even more fundamental is the “return” of Taiwan, which remains the holy grail of party politics because it would complete the sole task left unfinished following Mao’s revolution and establishment of the PRC in 1949. These internal security priorities will always remain central to the party’s perception of its continuing political legitimacy, given that Chinese
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