Think Putin is a global threat? Then we need to talk about Xi Jinping | Simon Tisdall

With repression at home and aggression abroad, the imperial ambitions of China's paramount leader' should worry the world

Like fearsome dictators throughout history, Xi Jinping has a tender side. He loves his mum. In a touching puff piece on Mother's Day this year, state TV showed China's strongman president strolling hand in hand with 96-year-old Qi Xin, a Communist party veteran and proud mother of the paramount leader.

Many mums read fairy stories or sing nursery rhymes to their young children. Not so Qi. She taught five-year-old Xi about Yue Fei, a famously hawkish Southern Song dynasty general who had Serve the country with utmost loyalty" tattooed on his back. This uplifting slogan had inspired his life's work, Xi claimed.