China's Police Presence in Canada

"During the past two years, the pandemic made international travels not easy and quite a few Chinese nationals found their Chinese ID cards and/or driver's licences expired or about to expire, and yet they could not get the ID  renewed back in China in time..."

Embassy of China in Ireland

Police in the Chinese city of Fuzhou show off seized counterfeit money in this 2009 photo. Fuzhou security services have now set up at least three branch offices on Canadian soil. Photo by STR/AFP/Getty Images

"I thought I'd have a safe, happy life in Canada. But the Chinese Communist Party was already here", said Sheng Xue, a Chinese Canadian living in Mississauga, Ontario since her escape from China in 1989, following the Ti8enanmen Square Massacre. The People's Republic of China has groping tentacles all over the world, keeping track of expatriate Chinese who sought to find a new home and with it security and a base where they could begin life anew. Beijing, however, looks to keep tabs on all Chinese, irrespective of whether they now live elsewhere than China, and they are particularly interested in Chinese who oppose their government back home.

 

Beijing has also made it quite clear to Chinese living abroad that their first obligation is to China, not any other country which they have chosen to live in as loyal citizens. Chinese living abroad with citizenship in other countries are expected to be compliant with any demands that the People's
Republic makes of them, from defending China from criticism in their new countries of citizenship, to conveying useful information to China through its United Front Work Department, which has offices set up across the world. 

Chinese living abroad are also expected to be cooperative with Chinese embassies and consulates abroad, representing China's interests. Most Chinese who emigrate abroad from Mainland China find it expedient to cooperate in support of the Chinese Communist Party mostly because of China's coercive policies of harassing family members back in China if their members living abroad fail to cooperate. Those originally hailing from Hong Kong tend to be opponents of the CCP, and the long, probing, intrusive arm of the CCP makes certain they are acutely aware that Hong Kong is now under direct control of Beijing.

China-dissidents of the Beijing government based in Canada have warned Canadian authorities for years of the organized harassment from Chinese authorities that they face, despite their Canadian citizenship. Now, investigative reporting has revealed that the People's Republic has installed what can only be identified as Chinese police stations in countries abroad, focused on controlling Chinese living as citizens in countries other than China. In Toronto, Canada, there are three 'service stations' in operation by the Fuzhou Public Security Bureau, a police force from the Chinese metropolis of Fuzhou.

 

The Fuzhou police say it has already opened 30 such stations in 21 countries.

 

The Asian human rights group Safeguard Defenders has revealed the presence of these furtively-operated police stations in a recently published report. According to China, the stations' existence relates to the need to give assistance to Chinese expatriates in the completion of administrative documents like the renewal of driver's licenses. However, according to Safeguard Defenders, the function of the stations is that of outposts for "Involuntary Return" policies, a program that compels Chinese nationals to return to China should the country's security service consider they have violated Chinese law.

"These operations eschew official bilateral police and judicial cooperations", the report states. Chinese authorities claim that 230,000 expats were "persuaded to return" as a result of various charges laid against them. Those charged respond to the persuasion of the threat of extreme sanctions to be visited on their families in China, including asset seizures and prohibitions against government health care or education opportunities.

Canada is among several dozen countries that have become outposts of Chinese law enforcement. A report in The Irish Times highlighted the opening of a Fuzhou Overseas Police Service Station in central Dublin. In Dublin the Chinese Embassy declared the station to function as a place for Fuzhou expats to seek assistance in routine paperwork. 

 

An investigation in Canada by the Globe and Mail newspaper found that the Association was founded with direct Chinese government oversight. Leading to the question: why is Canada permitting China to establish its own police stations in Canada? More to the point, why is the government of Canada allowing Canadian citizens of Chinese extraction to be harassed, bullied and terrorized by the People's Republic of China?!!!

 

The Diplomacy of Supreme Vindictiveness

"Detainees are forced to spend the whole day sitting or squatting on the floor, which causes joint and muscle deterioration."

"At night, they sleep on a hard, rough wooden floor without enough bedcovers to keep warm."

"The toilet is a hole in the floor in the corner of the cell."

"No hot water is provided, and prisoners must wash in cold water from a crude tap."

Former British journalist Peter Humphreys, The Diplomat

 

"There were fourteen people in my cell. And the cell was not very big."

"So basically the beds were all together and there was a small aisle down the middle and a washroom in the corner."

"...There was absolutely no privacy."

Kevin Garratt, Canadian national, formerly imprisoned in China

Michael Kovrig, left, and Michael Spavor were seized by Chinese authorities after the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at Vancouver International Airport just over two years ago./The Associated Press

When in December of 2018 Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested through a U.S.Justice Department international warrant in an extradition treaty between Canada and the United States on charges of misleading an U.S. bank leading it to unknowingly break U.S. sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran, two Canadians who happened to be in China were arrested in retaliation immediately afterward, on eventual charges of espionage; spying against China's security interests.

Hearings are still ongoing in Vancouver over the Huawei executive's extradition, where Ms.Meng is out on bail living in one of her two mansions in the city. The two Canadian men, one a diplomat with Canada's foreign service temporarily on leave before his arrest, but in China working for an NGO, Crisis Group, the other a businessman-entrepreneur who arranges for tour trips to North Korea, have since languished in Chinese prisons awaiting eventual release.

 

Michael Kovrig in an image taken from his Facebook page.

 

Beijing has no intention, however, of releasing the men until and unless Ms.Meng is permitted to return to China, claiming that she has been illegally detained, in contrast to the two Canadians whose imprisonment was just and with cause. Their summary arrest on allegations clearly trumped up, is not the sole occasion where Canadians in China have been punished; several others were re-sentenced for drug offences after Ms.Meng's detainment -- to death sentences and execution.

 

In this file photo taken on January 13, 2014 Michael Spavor and former U.S. basketball player Dennis Rodman arrive at Beijing International Airport from North Korea. Prior to his detention, Spavor worked to arrange Western visits to North Korea. Photo by Wang Zhao/Getty Images/AFP

 

Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor have been imprisoned by Chinese authorities for over two years. They are being held in barbaric conditions; neither has seen sunlight or been exposed to the open air during that time. Both were interrogated endlessly in an obvious intention to break their spirits. They cannot admit to having indulged in any nefarious plots because the charges were plucked out of thin air. 

Michael Kovrig is being held in Beijing, while Michael Spavor is imprisoned at Dandong Detention Centre in Dandong, a Chinese city across the Yalu River from North Korea; understandable, since this is the area where Mr. Spavor stationed himself and where his business would have been conducted from. Both were denied Canadian consular service and legal advice. The letters they are permitted to write to their families are heavily censored.

 

 

The cells in which both men spend their endless days are approximately three metres by three metres, shared with other prisoners. No furniture is in the cells, their sleeping arrangements comprised of thin mats rolled up during the day. Rudimentary toilet facilities shared among cellmates speak to the hygienic conditions. There are no exercise yards, no dining halls; no one is permitted to leave their cells for any reason.

Meals consist of boiled rice and vegetables served in dog bowls pushed under the doors. Michael Kovrig, the former diplomat who had previously been posted to China, is fluent in Mandarin and thus is able to speak with other detainees who share his cell. Michael Spavor's specialty language is Korean. Both men have been exposed to 24-hour-daily lights in their cells. 

The Dandong Detention Centre has been reported to have bright red Chinese characters painted large on its looming grey walls with the legend ordering prisoners to "listen to the Party's orders". 

Michael Spavor at the Dandong Detention Centre.  Nathan VanderKlippe/The Globe and Mail