HANOI: Vietnamese social media users changed their profile pictures to black on Saturday in a show of mourning for the country’s late leader Nguyen Phu Trong, whose death was announced the previous day.

Users on Facebook, X and Threads also posted photos and eulogies of the former Communist Party general secretary after Vietnam’s state media announced on Friday that the 80-year-old had died at a military hospital in Hanoi “due to old age and serious illness”. Vietnam has one of the most heavily restricted media environments in the world and citizens are often hesitant to express their views online.

“A great heart has stopped,” Hoang Quoc Ky wrote on his Facebook page after changing his cover photo to a picture of Vietnam’s flag flying at half-mast. “He was a bright and perfect communist, a sharp politician... who devoted his whole life for socialism and the happiness of the people,” Ky added.

“Trong was a very enthusiastic patriot in his own manner,” blogger DzungArt Nguyen wrote in a Facebook post.

“(We) acknowledge his passion... may he rest in peace.” The profile pictures of social media accounts for Vietnamese state media agencies were also changed to black, with companies and NGOs in the country following suit.

In Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited the Vietnamese embassy “to mourn the passing” of his fellow communist party general secretary, state news outlet Xinhua reported. Trong’s death was announced a day after Vietnam’s Communist Party said he would hand the reins of power to the country’s president and former public security minister To Lam.

At the time, the party said Trong would be focusing on treatment for an undisclosed medical condition, the first time it had addressed long-standing speculation about the ageing leader’s health.

There were no further details about Trong’s illness, and the party said it would later make “a special statement on the organization of the funeral at the national level”. After arrangements for Trong’s funeral are announced, an official period of mourning will begin, with flags flown at half mast and all cultural and art activities cancelled. Entertainment and sporting event organizers have already suspended activities. Trong is the first party general secretary to die in office since the death in 1986 of Le Duan, a brother-in-arms of Ho Chi Minh.

He is also the first leader to have held three consecutive mandates as the head of the party, after the liberalization of the economy in 1986. — AFP