China Operating Illegal Police Stations Worldwide

[] [China Operating Illegal Police Stations Worldwide]( by Judith Bergman • December 2, 2022 at 5:00 am [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [WhatsApp]( [Telegram]( [Send]( [Print]( - China has set up at least 54 overseas police stations in 30 countries, including in the United States (New York), Canada, Spain, Italy, France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Hungary, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Brazil, Argentina and Nigeria, according to a recent report from Safeguard Defenders, a human rights NGO. - The police stations are part of China's campaign to "persuade" Chinese citizens suspected of criminal acts – particularly telecommunications fraud, but also political "crimes" such as political dissent – to return to China to face criminal persecution. China not only threatens the Chinese citizens themselves but also members of their families who have stayed behind in China. Such threats have been continuing for years, as FBI Director Christopher Wray pointed out in 2020, when he mentioned a case from the US in which a Chinese government "emissary" visited a target in the US and told him that he could choose between returning to China or committing suicide. - China's overseas police stations purport merely to have administrative or consular functions, but function as means of threatening Chinese abroad to return to China, thereby skipping the necessary legal requirements under international law. - Crucially, the police stations operate without the consent and knowledge of the host countries, such as in the Netherlands, where one of the police stations operates out of a plain ground-floor apartment in Rotterdam belonging to a small Chinese handyman business. - Beijing, not surprisingly, has denied all wrongdoing. "The organizations you mentioned are not police stations or police service centers," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian Zhao insisted. "Their activities are to assist local Chinese citizens who need to apply for expired driver's license renewal online...." - Safeguard Defenders has appealed to countries to take swift action against the police stations. - "Action needs also be taken to protect a quickly growing Chinese diaspora in the target countries, unless the latter are content with having a foreign government police minority groups on their territory, often to the intentional detriment of the target country and its policies, and aimed at intimidating the diaspora into obedience to the CCP anywhere in the world. Dedicated reporting and protection mechanisms must urgently be made available." – Safeguard Defenders, January 18, 2022. (Image source: iStock) China has set up at least 54 overseas police stations in 30 countries, including in the United States (New York), Canada, Spain, Italy, France, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Hungary, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Brazil, Argentina and Nigeria, according to a recent report from Safeguard Defenders, a human rights NGO. Most of these police stations are located in Europe, with nine such police stations in major Spanish cities, four in Italy, and three in Paris, among others. According to Peter Dahlin, director of Safeguard Defenders, those are just the tip of the iceberg: "We are convinced that there are many more, because these only belong to two jurisdictions – Fuzhou and Qingtian, where most of the Chinese in Spain come from – and China itself admits that it has launched the project in ten. So it could be up to five times more." [Continue Reading Article]( [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [RSS]( [Donate]( Copyright © Gatestone Institute, All rights reserved. You are subscribed to this list as {EMAIL} You can change how you receive these emails: [Update your subscription preferences]( or [Unsubscribe from this list]( [Gatestone Institute]( 14 East 60 St., Suite 705, New York, NY 10022