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Photos leaked online fuel rumours of romance between China's 'red royals' - Telegraph
While Britain ponders the guest list for the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton, China's online citizens have been swapping leaked holiday photographs of the heirs of two of the country's most powerful revolutionary families.
The good-looking couple can be seen laughing and flirting apparently on a holiday to Tibet last year. Sharp-eyed netizens have zoomed in on the ring that adorns the girl's finger, wondering if it is a sign the pair will marry.
If they did, they would become a "political match, made in heaven" according to the South China Morning Post.
The boy in question is Bo Guagua: educated at Harrow and Balliol College, Oxford, he is the son Bo Xilai, the Communist boss of Chongqing, one of China's biggest cities, and the grandson of Bo Yibo, one of the eight "immortals" of the Communist revolution.
The girl is Chen Xiaodan: she the grandchild of another of the eight "immortals", Chen Yun, and the daughter of Chen Yuan, the governor of the China Development Bank and one of China's most influential bankers.
The photographs, which appear to be genuine, were posted online by a user called "UBC Talent," who claimed to be a friend of the pair in America where he said they are "a couple." Both are studying at Harvard, Miss Chen for an MBA, and Mr Bo at the Kennedy School of Government.
Traditionally the offspring of China's revolutionary families so-called "princelings" have kept a deliberately low profile to avoid allegations of cronyism and corruption that haunt the modern Communist Party, often enrolling at foreign schools and universities under pseudonyms.
However the princelings, who include Xi Jinping, the man expected to be the next president of China after Hu Jintao leaves office in 2012, occupy myriad positions in China's financial world and state monopolies such as power, telecoms, banking, oil and gas.
This is not the first time the younger Bo, now 24, has defied the unwritten rule of keeping a low profile after pictures of his partying antics at Oxford appeared online, attracting envy and criticism online for apparently living the high life.
More approving reports appearing in China's state media in 2009 after Bo was named among the top 10 "outstanding Chinese youngsters" by the British Chinese Youth Federation, with a report in the China Daily noting he had raised thousands of pounds for the victims of the Sichuan Earthquake.
Last year, against the advice of his father, Mr Bo gave an interview to Youth Weekend, a now-defunct state-backed Chinese newspaper, in which he revealed how he had travelled to England with his mother to learn English and won scholarships to Harrow School.
Asked whether he thought he might be prejudicing his father's career by taking such a high media profile, he replied "Why behave with mystery? My mum always said a man shall behave itself with transparency."
In the increasingly faceless world of Chinese high politics, where details of the lives of Politburo members are jealously guarded, his father, Bo Xilai is also a rule-breaker, running high-profile campaigns to tackle city corruption and revive 'revolutionary' values.
China analysts are watching closely to see if the elder Bo's strategy will win him promotion to the nine-member Politburo Standing Committee when the next generation of leaders takes the helm in two years time.
Online reactions to the innocent affections of the young 'royal couple' were mixed, however, with several citizens attacking the privilege of the scions of revolution, particularly when one photograph appeared to show their car having a three-vehicle police escort in Tibet.
While some complimented the handsome couple, and others offered best wishes and praised the anti-corruption work of Bo's father, others vented the kind of jealous anger that makes China's leaders highly sensitive to criticism that China's ruling party runs the country as a club of vested interests.
"Shameless red royalties, enemy of the people!", railed one net user. Another asked if this heralded "a political marriage of new era," while a third noted the police escort and scoffed at the "superior power" of the Party princelings.
I personally don't mind the few police cars but they really need to use a bit more discretion next time.
Also with the one child policy, if the princelings marry among themselves their number is sure going to drop.
I still fail to understand how on earth can parents name their kid 瓜瓜 though.
