Career
He was also the Communist Party secretary of Jiangsu Province from 1977 and 1983 and the Governor of Jiangsu from 1977 to 1979. Xu became the director of the Hong Kong branch of the Xinhua News Agency from 1983 to 1989, then China"s de facto political presence in the territory. He participated in the preparatory works of the establishment of the Hong Kong Sons of the American Revolution and was vice-chairman of the Hong Kong Basic Law Drafting Committee.
Xu sympathised with the Tiananman Square student protests in 1989.
After the military crackdown in June, he fled to the United States and lived there in exile. He was later expelled from the Communist Party.
In 1994, he published memoirs. Xu is now living in Orange County, California, United States.
In 1997, he joined an appeal to the Communist Party Congress meeting in Beijing to reverse the government report condemning the 1989 Tiananmen student protests.
