REUTERS/Tingshu WangHONG KONG/BEIJING/SHANGHAI, March 3 (Reuters) - As unprecedented protests against China's zero-COVID policies escalated in November, Li Qiang, the man recently elevated to No.2 on the ruling Communist Party's Politburo Standing Committee, seized the moment. Meanwhile, some local-level party workers and healthcare officials were grappling with growing challenges in implementing the zero-COVID policy. "From my perspective, it's not that we set out to relax the zero-COVID policy, it's more that we at the local level were simply not able to enforce the zero-COVID policy anymore," the official said. In mid-November, when Xi was still in Southeast Asia, he ordered Chinese authorities to "unswervingly" execute the zero-COVID policy, said two of the people, after which some cities retightened curbs. Xi's vacillating led to renewed debate on COVID policy among top leaders during mid to late November, one of these people and another person said.

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