Bob Mackin
In an open letter to Canada’s Minister of Public Safety and the Foreign Influence Commissioner, NDP MP Jenny Kwan is demanding officials verify findings of a new report on the global proliferation of illegal Chinese police stations.
“These allegations warrant immediate attention,” Kwan wrote in response to the Nov. 6 report called A Formula for Repression – China’s Global Grid for Community Control.
“The Canadian government has an obligation to verify the report’s findings, determine whether these operations are active in Canada and establish whether individuals or organizations are facilitating activities on behalf of the Chinese government that constitute foreign interference, intimidation or coercion.”
Jenny Kwan in the House of Commons (ParlVu)
The report’s author, Laura Harth of Safeguard Defenders, found more than 10 police forces from five Chinese provinces are involved in a global network of Chinese Communist Party operatives whose “core aim” is to control the diaspora.
In two 2022 reports, Safeguard Defenders detailed the activity of more than 100 overseas Chinese police stations in more than 50 countries. The RCMP investigated groups in Richmond, Toronto and Montreal, but did not recommend charges.
Kwan’s letter to Minister Gary Anandasangaree and Commissioner Anton Boegman asks whether Chinese overseas police stations or affiliated networks remain active or have expanded operations since 2022 in Canada. She seeks protection for any member of Canada’s Chinese, Hong Kong, Uyghur, Tibetan and Taiwan communities at risk of intimidation, surveillance and coercion.
“Canadians must be free to speak, organize, protest and participate in public life without fear of intimidation or reprisal from foreign states,” Kwan wrote.
“The Prime Minister and the Minister of Public Safety have an obligation to ensure that these allegations are investigated and addressed without delay.”
Run by the Overseas Chinese Federation
Harth’s new report explains how the Chinese Communist Party divides every city, town and village into grids of a few hundred households. Each grid has a manager who reports upward. Nine of the 10 tasks for managers involve surveillance and control.
“There is a file on every resident,” said Harth’s report. “Anything seen as a threat to Party rule is escalated to a hub where enforcement stands ready to act. Internationally, this system of mass surveillance, control and suppression is projected through a global grid of United Front-affiliated organizations or designated liaisons. They are run by the Party’s ‘bridge and bond’ to the diaspora: the Overseas Chinese Federation.”
Safeguard Defenders found nearly 1,250 liaisons in at least 91 countries carrying out domestic grid functions abroad.
“Policymakers must urgently devise strategies to confront this superstructure of CCP interference if the stations and their activities are to be shut down for good,” Harth wrote.
