Chinese Regime’s Tactics to Influence Canadian Officials, Corroborating CSIS Fadden’s comments

CFP and MWC: Falun Gong: Victims of the Chinese Communist regime's influence in CanadaAs victims of the Chinese Communist regime’s influence in Canada, Falun Gong practitioners’ experience in the past 11 years corroborate with the general comments of Mr. Richard Fadden, director of CSIS on foreign influence, and also match the patterns and tactics described by Mr. Chen Yonglin, a former Chinese diplomat.

In 2005, Chen Yonglin, First secretary and Consul for Political Affairs, defected from the Chinese consulate in Sydney and exposed the Chinese regime’s mandate for all Chinese embassies and consulates worldwide, to influence government officials, mobilize Chinese students and the Chinese community, and control the Chinese media to influence public policy on China.

Chen revealed that the tactics include putting pressure on the officials of various western governments and exchanging political benefits by economic means. He stated that one of the most effective methods used to develop influence over political leaders is to provide them with all-expenses-paid travel to China and lavish entertainment while they are there. This method is common to all Chinese foreign missions in the West.

He stated they also regularly promoted the private business ties of some Australian political leaders, state and federal MPs, and members of local councils.

He also said, “The control of the overseas Chinese community has been a consistent strategic objective of the Chinese Communist Party so as to penetrate into the mainstream of the host country. It’s not just in Australia. It is done this way in other countries like the U.S. and Canada, too.”

More testimony from Mr. Chen can be found in the Affidavit (available upon request).

Some explicit examples in Canada are as follows:

In May this year, media reported [1] [2] that the Mayor of Ottawa, Mr. Larry O’Brien, upon returning from a business trip to China, refused to proclaim Falun Dafa Day as he had done in previous years because he said he “made a commitment.” It was construed that he made a commitment to Chinese officials during his trip to China. City council later bypassed the mayor to proclaim Falun Dafa Day.

In 2009, at the Montreal Caribbean festival, Falun Dafa’s Tian Guo Marching Band was invited to join the parade. However, then Montreal City Councillor Mr. Marcel Tremblay asked the president of the festival to kick out the band right before the parade. The president refused. Mr. Tremblay had been an active participant of Chinese embassy-organized/participated events including some propaganda show [3] about Tibet denounced by many.

In 2005 the Globe and Mail detailed extensively how [4] the City of Toronto and many councilors are being targeted by the Chinese consulate and its agents to follow the Party line on how Falun Gong and other groups unfavoured by the communist regime should be treated in Toronto.

Chen Xiaoling, the Chinese consul general in Toronto, wrote to all 44 city councilors, including Mayor David Miller, threatening the city to comply not to hold a Falun Dafa Day. She wrote that if the motion is passed it “will have a very negative effect on our future beneficial exchanges and cooperation.” The motion did not pass.

In 2007, the mayor of Port Alberni proclaimed Falun Dafa Day, and then he received a letter from the Chinese Consulate General spreading hate propaganda towards Falun Gong and asking him not to proclaim Falun Dafa Day in 2008. Since then, the mayor has stopped issuing the proclamation.

These examples showed us a serious cause for alarm for all Canadian citizens that our cherished democratic values, freedom and principles of Canada can be eroded and sacrificed by foreign influence.

Similar situations have taken place around the world.

The unanimously passed U.S. 304 Resolution [5] calling on the Chinese regime to end the persecution and interference in the U.S. from Chinese officials.

Another example [6] is happening right now in Germany where the German authorities are investigating a spy with links to the Chinese regime who was caught spying on Falun Gong.

A clear example of the mobilization of students by the Chinese embassy occurred right on Parliament Hill on June 24 during Hu Jintao’s visit to Canada. Students, paid and bussed from different cities, appeared to be holding a welcome activity for the Chinese leader, but actually they were there to target other Canadians.

First secretary Liu Shaohua from the education department at the Chinese embassy was caught on tape telling Chinese students that they were going into battle against Canadians who sought to bring awareness to the horrific human rights environment in China during Hu’s visit. Yuan Pinghua, another organizer, continued: “Now in a word this is like waging war, so today we are mobilizing for war, having all of you raise your guard.”

It is unconscionable for a repressive government to use the freedom of a democracy to project abroad its persecution of its chosen victims. Democratic values do not require tolerance of this sort of behaviour.

When Mr. Fadden exposed this issue, he in fact raised awareness of a threat that could seriously harm Canadian sovereignty and democracy if left unchecked. Actually, Canadian democracy is under subtle invasion from a totalitarian regime. This is the core issue deserving attention.
Mr. Richard Fadden has done a formidable service to Canada by bringing these threats from foreign regimes to the attention of the Canadian people.

Lucy Zhou
Falun Dafa Association of Canada

More examples:

• To call for an end to the brutal persecution in China, Vancouver Falun Gong practitioners set up a vigil with display boards and a hut in front of the Chinese consulate in 2001. Since then, the city of Vancouver has been under pressure to remove the vigil. Mr. Sam Sullivan, elected mayor in 2005, after being “treated like an emperor” on a visit to China, took on as his responsibility to have the display board removed. Sullivan admitted that he had never even read the bylaw which he sought to invoke as the vehicle to remove this thorn in the side of the Chinese Communist Party.
• A former MP from British Columbia who had written a support letter asked us to remove his letter from the Falun Gong website, because Chinese consulate refused to issue him a visa to China for a business trip otherwise.
• For the first few years after the persecution began, the Chinese embassy and consulates routinely sent anti-Falun Gong hate propaganda to all MPs, MPPs, and city councilors of a number of cities.
• In December 2000, several MPs attended a press conference to support efforts to rescue Canadian citizen Prof. Kunlun Zhang, who was imprisoned in China for practicing Falun Gong. After the press conference, the Chinese state-run newspaper, People’s Daily, reported that the president of the Ottawa-Carleton Chinese Federation, a front organization of the Chinese embassy claiming to represent 25 Chinese community groups then, wrote to all the MPs who attended the press conference and asked them to stay away from Falun Gong. Several of the MPs confirmed that they had received these letters.
• In May 2008, an Ottawa city employee of Chinese origin excluded our local Falun Gong group from participating in the “Health Is Wealth” event during Asian Heritage Month after our group had earlier been informed that we would be included. A complaint has been filed to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal.
• In May 2008, Falun Gong’s Tianguo Marching Band was banned from performing at the Ottawa Tulip Festival a few minutes before its scheduled performance, due to Chinese embassy pressure. After a media blitz and public outcry, festival organizers eventually apologized and welcomed the band back.
• In 2005 the vice chair of the Chinese students’ association at University of Ottawa wrote to student Ms. Lingdi Zhang that according to investigations by the association, she was still a Falun Gong member, and warned her to “watch out for herself”. The email said that “The University of Ottawa Chinese Students’ Association is under the direct leadership of the Education Office at the Chinese Embassy in Canada.”
• In January 2006, the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal ruled that the Ottawa Chinese Senior’s Association discriminated when it terminated the membership of Daiming Huang, a 73-year-old Canadian citizen, because she practiced Falun Gong. The association was in fact acting under the instruction of the Chinese Embassy.
• In 2005, when Chinese public security officer Hao Fengjun defected to Australia, he brought with him intelligence information of Canadian Falun Gong practitioners smuggled out from China. One of the documents that went public was intelligence info about Ms. Jillian Ye, a Falun Gong practitioner in Toronto.
• The spying and information collection by the Chinese regime caused a few Canadian practitioners arrested when they went back to China for work reasons or to see families. For example, Ms. Ying Zhu [7] from Montreal and Ms. Ying Li from Vancouver.
• Hundreds of Falun Gong practitioners around the world, including some in the cities of Vancouver, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal have received harassing phone calls for years since 1999. (It was reported in 2005 by Globe and Mail)
• In 2005, Edmonton police after a one-year investigation reported that the materials spread by the Chinese consulate in Calgary at a conference in June 2004 at the University of Edmonton constituted hate propaganda.
• On December 15, 2001, Talentvision aired an anti-Falun Gong propaganda program from the Chinese state-run TV station CCTV. The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council (CBSC) later ruled that it breached Canadian codes of ethics and required Talenvision to announce the CBSC decision on the air.
• In the fall of 2001, the Chinese embassy pressured both DFAIT and the city of Ottawa to restrict the daily Falun Gong vigil in front of the embassy. President of Ottawa—Carleton Chinese Federation, known in the community as the voice for the Chinese embassy, filed a complaint and the city attempted to use a by-law to restrict the vigil. Fortunately the city’s Transport Committee unanimously passed a motion to grant an exemption to the by-law allowing the protest to continue in a visible manner.
• Falun Gong participated in the 2001 Tulip Festival Flotilla, but in 2002 the festival organizer barred our group from joining the Flotilla, saying that the festival had promised the Chinese embassy to exclude us. It was only after a media outcry that the festival allowed our group to rejoin the flotilla.
• In 2007, Ms. Jiyan Zhang, a defector and wife of a diplomat of the Chinese embassy in Ottawa, revealed that Ambassador Lu Shumin personally delivered anti-Falun Gong materials to MPs. Lu Shumin also personally delivered anti-Falun Gong hate propaganda to former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson.
• A 2007 secret document from the Chinese embassy showed that it had given instructions to mobilize Chinese students and communities to write to the CRTC to prevent a TV station critical of the Chinese regime from getting a licence to air in Canada.
• Chinese Regime has have engaged in hacking of dissident Falun Gong website and Falun Gong practitioners computer systems outside of China for the past 10 years continuously.
• For example, in July 1999 the Falun Gong websites in four countries (one in Britain, two in Canada, one in Australia, and two in the United States) that reported real-time the situation in China were attacked to the point of no function. The attacker was traced back to the Public Security Bureau in China.