Punishing Dissenters ... There is No Escape From the CPC

"To escape further persecution, he [Dong Guangping], managed to make it to Thailand in 2015, where he was granted official refugee status by the UNHCR."

"As he awaited resettlement to Canada in a Bangkok immigration detention centre, Chinese police walked in, handcuffed him in front of Thai officers and led him out."

"Dong later resurfaced in detention in China ... where he was sentenced to three years in prison."

"Foreign governments must ensure all diplomatic discussions on these issues take place in an open, transparent and public space and, where possible, expose activities carried out on its soil by overseas agencies that violate its judicial sovereignty."

"Without transparency, violators are encouraged to continue and expand their activities. Silence will increase the transgressions, not reduce them."

Safeguard Defenders human rights, Madrid

 

"The main purpose of Xi isn’t just to get these people back to China — it’s to prevent Chinese high-level government officers from escaping from China."

"He wants to show even if you escape to the U.S., I can still get you back to China."

Gao Guangjun, New York-based attorney

Police stand outside a detention centre housing Uyghurs in Xinjiang Province  AP

 

According to a report from Safeguard Defenders. an estimated 1,421 forced repatriations took place in 2020 and another 1,114 in 2021. The human rights group estimated an increase in forced repatriations despite widespread travel restrictions where China sought out and forcibly returned "fugitives" it represents as criminals, back to China, where they are prosecuted and sent to prison.

 

These are called out as state-sanctioned kidnapping, labelling Chinese who disagree with the ruling Chinese Communist Party as a dictatorship holding the entire population hostage to its Marxist ideology and thus becoming enemies of the state who can be accused of undermining the authority of the government and face prison sentences.

According to Chinese government sources responding to criticism, these people are taken back to China to face trial for economic crimes or for crimes related to their official duties. The targets, however, stand out as "lawyers, dissidents, bloggers, journalists, Tibetans, Uyghurs and Hong-Kongers". Methods used in their capture range from refusal to renew passports,  to covert operations viewed as "state-sanctioned kidnappings", according to the Safeguard Defenders report.

The report mentions the issuing of Interpol red notices, the intimidation of family members in China by state actors, and state agents taking to threatening their targets in person. Among some of the targets have been those tricked into travelling to a third country from which they could be extradited.

The case was cited of a Chinese human rights defender, Dong Guangping, who had previously served three years in prison in China on charges of inciting subversion of state power in the early 2000s. In 2014 he was again sentenced to another detention of eight months, before he escaped, only to be  hounded down and brought back to China.

According to data cited in the report, Uyghurs are being targeted increasingly in a similar vein. Over 300 cases have been tracked by the Uyghur Human Rights Project, which warns the real number is likely to be much higher in actual fact. For its part, China has always denied kidnappings or that the state violates foreign and international laws.

 

Yet since 2015, Beijing's Operation Sky Net has made targets of thousands of 'criminals' sought by China to be brought from abroad where they are illegally captured to be taken back to China. The program appears to have been expanded to include Uyghurs seeking refuge abroad, escaping their persecution in Xinjiang and their mass detention for forced labour.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is seen on a giant screen as he delivers a speech at the event marking the 100th founding anniversary of the Communist Party of China, on Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China, July 1, 2021.