{"id":76591,"date":"2026-03-05T10:56:19","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T01:56:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/05\/yao-ming-former-basketballer-china-two-sessions-meetings"},"modified":"2026-03-05T10:56:19","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T01:56:19","slug":"why-does-yao-ming-the-7ft-6in-ex-basketballer-attend-chinas-two-sessions-meetings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=76591","title":{"rendered":"Why does Yao Ming, the 7ft 6in ex-basketballer, attend China\u2019s Two Sessions meetings?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Among the 3,000 delegates is former athlete who sits as an independent on the National People\u2019s Congress<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/04\/china-two-sessions-2026-meeting-what-are-they-when-is-it-explainer\">What are China\u2019s Two Sessions and why do they matter?<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/03\/china-two-sessions-president-xi-economy-defence-technology\">More generals purged as gather in Beijing<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Among the generally drab lineup of mostly middle-aged men in suits who make up the nearly 3,000 delegates to the National People\u2019s Congress (NPC), China\u2019s parliament, a few stand out.<\/p>\n<p>There are delegates from China\u2019s 55 official ethnic minority groups, who often arrive dressed in traditional outfits rather than western-style suits. There are military members, identifiable by their uniforms. And then there is Yao Ming, the 7ft and 6in tall retired basketball player who, towering over every other person in the Great Hall of the People, is hard to miss.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/mar\/05\/yao-ming-former-basketballer-china-two-sessions-meetings\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Among the 3,000 delegates is former athlete who sits as an independent on the National People\u2019s CongressWhat are China\u2019s Two Sessions and why do they matter?More generals purged as gather in BeijingAmong the generally drab lineup of mostly middle-aged &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3580,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,50,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-china","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3580"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76591"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76592,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76591\/revisions\/76592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}