China’s ethnic affairs agency will be headed by a Han Chinese for the first time in 66 years as the current chairperson Bagatur steps down.

Chen Xiaojiang, previously the vice chairperson of the National Supervisory Commission, will take over Bagatur, of Mongolian descent, at the top of the National Ethnic Affairs Commission, an official announcement showed.

He will be the second Han Chinese to lead the ethnic affairs agency since its establishment alongside the country’s founding in 1949. Its first chairperson, Li Weihan, was also of Han ethnicity, the majority race in China.

The new appointment showed that the Communist Party was distrustful of other ethnicities and was working toward assimilation, Mongolian-Japanese scholar Yang Haiying said.

Chen has a background in water resources management, having previously chaired the Yellow River Conservancy Commission. He was appointed to head the propaganda arm of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection in 2015, and then became the deputy minister of supervision in 2017. His role at the anti-corruption National Supervisory Commission began in 2018.

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