Since January, bomb and death threats by email have targeted Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te, South Korean President Lee Jae-myung, Italian President Sergio Mattarella, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen. Among the latest on the list is Albanese.
The emails are all similar in tone and in the graphic threats they make. All have been written in Chinese. Their message is the same: cancel scheduled shows by Shen Yun Performing Arts or face consequences.
“If you insist on proceeding with the Shen Yun performance, something will happen to the Canadian prime minister,” reads a Feb. 10 email obtained by The Epoch Times. “If you don’t care about Mark Carney and all Canadian high-ranking officials’ personal safety, then go ahead with the performance.”
“Won’t rule out shooting Lai Ching-te!” reads another from Jan. 8. “Or even crashing an explosives-loaded SUV into the Presidential Office Building. Go on if you don’t believe me.”
An Escalating Campaign
While none of the threats turned out to be real, they represent an escalation of a decades-long campaign targeting the New York-based performing arts company.Performing under the slogan “China Before Communism,” Shen Yun depicts traditional Chinese culture through classical Chinese dance and music. Each year, it performs for a global live audience of around 1 million. The Epoch Times is a media sponsor of Shen Yun.
After first surfacing about two years ago, the threats now total more than 130 and counting, according to the Falun Dafa Information Center. The actors behind them began by targeting both Shen Yun’s performers and their families, as well as the company’s training facilities.
National Security Concerns
An Australian federal investigation is now putting the latest round of intimidation in the spotlight.The law enforcement authorities ushered Albanese to another location for hours as they searched The Lodge in Canberra, ultimately finding no threat to public safety.
Meanwhile, Queensland Police are investigating another bomb threat to the Gold Coast venue that forced staff to evacuate.
To Lucy Zhao, president of the Falun Dafa Association of Australia, the situation highlights a dangerous trajectory that “warrants urgent attention at the highest levels of government.”
“When threats extend to a nation’s elected leader, this is no longer solely a matter of religious freedom or artistic expression—it becomes a direct challenge to national sovereignty, democratic governance, and public safety,” she said in a statement.
“Democracies cannot permit foreign authoritarian regimes to export coercion, intimidation, and fear onto their soil.”
When asked about the threats against Australia’s prime minister during a press briefing in Beijing, a spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry dodged the question, saying she had noted the relevant reports but was “not aware of the actual situation.” She then went on to use derogatory terms to attack Shen Yun and Falun Gong.
The exchange, curiously, was later scrubbed from the official transcript on the ministry’s website. That order, however, did not appear to filter down to the Chinese Embassy in Australia, which went on to publish the entire exchange on its Facebook page.
Shen Yun says it won’t be deterred.
“The fact that they’re threatening the lives of world leaders to cancel Shen Yun demonstrates the level of thuggery and desperation the CCP has resorted to,” Shen Yun Vice President Ying Chen told The Epoch Times.
“It also clearly demonstrates how terrified Beijing is that we expose the tyranny of the CCP on stages around the world.”
Pressure, Push Back
Australian parliamentarian Barnaby Joyce said the threats were an affront to what his country stands for.“It is totally unacceptable in Australia to intimidate someone who is practicing their religion, in a form that is no threat to Australian culture, and does not intrude on the rights of others,” he told The Epoch Times.
When the Chinese Embassy in Denmark recently issued a statement telling people not to see Shen Yun, local lawmakers also pushed back.
“I would be ashamed if I listened to what the communist dictator in China says and thinks when participating in various events,” Danish People’s Party lawmaker Mikkel Bjorn said.
Danish Liberal Party lawmaker Kim Valentin said the Chinese regime’s actions only underscore its desire for control.
“In Denmark, the State does not interfere in what you should and should not participate in,” he said. “I was just reminded of that—that you don’t have that freedom in China.
“I really hope this means that many more people will want to watch Shen Yun’s performance.”
Carl Andersen of the Liberal Alliance Party, who also sits on the Danish Parliament’s Ecclesiastical Affairs Committee, condemned the Chinese Embassy for engaging in “foreign interference.”
He said he has reported the threats to the Danish leader to the country’s intelligence agency and police for investigation.
The Danes need to “stand against such pressure from authoritarian regimes,” he said.
