Death Threats and Bomb Scares

The CCP’s repression reaches New York and everywhere else

Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) speaks at a press conference and rally in front of the America ChangLe Association highlighting Beijing’s transnational repression, in New York on Feb. 25, 2023. A now-closed overseas Chinese police station is located inside the association building. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)

Commentary

China’s transnational repression is hitting New Yorkers. On June 21, a former New York City cop, Michael McMahon, was convicted of acting as an illegal Chinese agent and stalking and intimidating a New Jersey resident.

The victim, Xu Jin, was a former official from Wuhan, China. McMahon was hired as a private investigator to surveil Xu. The former sergeant allegedly got paid for his crimes, including a $5,000 wad of cash from a Chinese official in a Panera Bread restaurant.

Bread, indeed. Plenty of it.

Through surveillance and intimidation, Beijing sought to pressure Xu into returning to China. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) held Xu’s wife and children as virtual hostages. They weren’t allowed to leave the country and reunite the family.

One of McMahon’s co-defendants allegedly posted a threatening note on Xu’s front door: “If you are willing to go back to the mainland and spend 10 years in prison, your wife and children will be all right.”

Shocking allegations of transnational repression such as this are on the rise globally.

In the UK on June 12, Hongkongers celebrated the fourth anniversary of the 2019 democracy protests. Resisting communist China’s infiltration and political influence was a theme of the anniversary rallies.

Two people celebrating in Southampton, about 75 miles southwest of London, were physically attacked by pro-Beijing thugs as they left a rally. The thugs later posted a video of their attack, apparently assured of no accountability for their apparent criminality.

So far, they’re correct.

On June 18, an incisive 60 Minutes Australia production by Laura Sparkes and Tara Brown detailed multiple alleged transgressions by the CCP’s “international shadow police force,” including in the Netherlands and Poland.

Beijing apparently targeted an academic, a journalist, an artist, two activists, and the mother of one of the activists. Chinese agents sent fake letters in their victims’ names that threatened violence or career-ending character assassination. Two of the CCP scams resulted in false arrests. Some of the victims received death threats.

The parents of a Netherlands-based activist, Wang Xiyu, were detained for more than a year in a CCP attempt to force him to surrender to a secret Chinese police station in Rotterdam, Netherlands—one of more than 100 identified by the nonprofit organization Safeguard Defenders. The overseas police outposts were established in more than 50 countries around the world, including in New York City, Paris, Vancouver, and Sydney. CCP police stations can also be found in Japan, South Korea, and Peru. The stations are used to collect intelligence and even forcibly repatriate Chinese dissidents to China to be imprisoned.

Drew Pavlou, an Australian activist and critic of Beijing, received dozens of death threats. On a trip to London, he was arrested based on a fake bomb scare in his name against the Chinese Embassy. He had nothing to do with it.

Pavlou and his mother, Vanessa, were both subsequently threatened with an AU$50,000 bounty on their heads. Beijing’s thugs attacked Vanessa’s character, apparently in an attempt to get her fired.

“I’m always looking over my shoulder,” Vanessa told 60 Minutes. “But I just try to live a normal life because otherwise, they win, don’t they?”

Andrew Phelan, one of the two Australians who suffered false arrest, was also featured on 60 Minutes. He called the arrest “surreal, incredibly confronting.”

“It was horrible,” he said. “I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.”

Phelan said he believes that the CCP’s intelligence service was behind his arrest and that he’s angry “that this is done from the shadows, anonymously.” He said the regime targets Westerners who are publicly critical of the CCP.

The CCP wants the world to cooperate with its version of transnational law, which is actually totalitarianism, up to and including genocide when it deems fit.

It should go without saying that cooperation with totalitarianism is dangerous for democracy. The CCP is an unelected regime and has no right to govern China, much less expect cooperation in doing so or imposing its rule abroad. The CCP’s methods are terroristic, so recognizing CCP law is tantamount to rewarding terrorism.

Victor Gao, a former diplomat from China, implied on 60 Minutes that those who violate Beijing’s interpretation of the “One China” policy, that Taiwan is an integral part of mainland China, are unsafe. He told 60 Minutes that for violators, “there will be no free haven anywhere in the world ... sooner or later justice may be served.”

The regime in Beijing conceives of “justice” as its own global hegemony. Therefore, democracies and our allies must take the strongest possible steps against each case of transnational repression. We must stop the micro-expansion and normalization of the CCP’s reach and control.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.