NEW YORK—It was this time a year ago the bizarre and violent incidents in Flushing, a small city in Queens, started petering out.
What in late May 2008 appeared at first to be an ethnic conflict turned out to be what victims claim were organized attacks backed by a foreign communist regime against religious dissidents and critics of the Chinese regime here in the U.S.
Soon after the attacks began the Chinese consul general in New York, Peng Keyu, boasted of encouraging and congratulating the attackers, as evidenced by a recording of a phone conversation made by someone pretending to be a supporter. City Councilmember John Liu and State Assemblywoman Ellen Young were also found to have met with and given tacit support to those accused of the attacks.
Before John Liu took what some in the community consider his peculiar stance toward the violence against Falun Gong practitioners in his district, he was honored in China by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its affiliated media as a rising political star, though his only political activities have been here in New York City.
To ‘Promote Understanding’
From March 29 to April 1 in 2007, Liu was taken on an escorted trip to China with six leaders of Chinese associations in New York. The trip, which was announced by the state’s official Xinhua News Agency, was planned by Lu Chengrui, chairman of the Union of the Chinese Organization Leaders, a group with close ties to the CCP.
Such trips for foreign officials to visit China are understood within the CCP’s propaganda apparatus as designed to “promote their understanding and keep expanding the collaboration and exchange between these people and our city.”
The meaning of “promote their understanding” is illustrated by a CCP official’s report after he met with Chinese community leaders in New York. Published on the Web site of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office in Beijing, an arm of the Central Propaganda Department, on Sept. 26, 2006, in an essay entitled “My emotional ties to the work of overseas Chinese affairs” Zhong Guiren, chairman of the Returned Overseas Chinese Federation in the Dongcheng District of Beijing, speaks about his work of meeting with the leaders of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, the Tsung Tsin Association, as well as other Chinese community leaders in New York City.
Watch NTDTV report on "China's United Front Infiltrates NY Politics."
He explains the success of relaying CCP propaganda, “In response to their questions and doubts, I provided truthful information about the ‘June 4’ Incident [the Tiananmen Square Student Massacre on June 4, 1989], the true face of Falun Gong [the persecuted religious practice] … and the real objectives of those who advocate ‘Taiwan independence’ or ‘Tibetan independence’ and the Chinese government’s policy toward these people,” Guiren said.
He explains how the New York Chinese organizations began to open up contact with officials from the Chinese Consulates and Embassies after his first friendly discussion.
The Chinese Embassy made arrangements similar to those that were made for John Liu for some of the group leaders to go China. Afterward, he says that those who went on to China changed their interests in the favor of the CCP.
“In the past, the leaders of the Chinese organizations and associations in New York City’s Chinatown were all pro-Taiwan; now they have tilted toward mainland China, and they have increasingly agreed to a peaceful reunification of China and the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” Guiren said.
The statement, “peaceful reunification of China,” refers to objectives of The China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification (China Council), which was formed on Sept. 22, 1988 in Beijing.
The China Council is controlled by the CCP Central Committee, along with the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council.
According to its Web site, the China Council’s work outside China has two purposes. One is to “blend into local high-level politics,” while the other is to “influence mainstream society.”
A Mayor Like John Liu
John So, the first Chinese Mayor of Melbourne, Australia, also received special treatment in China. John So went to China in 2007, through the arrangement of overseas Chinese organizations, just as Liu’s trip had been arranged by the head of an overseas association in New York.
In 2003, So prohibited Falun Gong practitioners from participating in his city’s annual Moomba parade. His prohibition of the group was given on short notice, with his reasoning being that Falun Gong practitioners were “too political.” The charge of being “political” is a standard feature of CCP propaganda used to support its persecution of the Falun Gong.
On April 7, 2004, So was fined $200,000 by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, and was ordered to make a public apology to Falun Gong. He was also later granted membership to the Council for the Promotion of United Front Work in China.
