Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sent Chinese New Year greetings to a Toronto organization that’s facing allegations of serving as a secret Chinese police station.
The Canada Toronto Fuqing Business Association (CTFQBA) highlighted Mr. Trudeau’s greeting letter in a Feb. 24 post on the social media platform WeChat. The greeting was sent for the group’s Chinese New Year gala held on Feb. 10 in the Toronto area. Among those attending were two officials from the Chinese Consulate in Toronto, Hao Peng and Sheng Jiang.
“I am pleased to extend my warmest greetings to everyone celebrating Chinese New Year,” Mr. Trudeau wrote. “On behalf of the Government of Canada, I offer my best wishes to all those ringing in Chinese New Year.”
CTFQBA states on its website that it operates “under the guidance” of various Chinese central and provincial government bodies, including the municipal-level committee of the United Front Work Department in Fuqing, a city in Fujian Province on the southeast coast of China, near the Taiwan Strait. The United Front is widely recognized as Beijing’s primary foreign interference body.
The Epoch Times reached out to the Prime Minister’s Office for comment but didn’t immediately hear back.
Secret Chinese Police Stations
A September 2022 report by the Spain-based NGO Safeguard Defenders first brought to public attention the Chinese communist regime’s operation of covert Chinese police stations overseas.The report cited a name and address list of 30 “overseas police service stations” established in more than 20 countries by a Chinese police bureau in Fuzhou City, Fujian Province. Included among them was the address of a building in Markham, Ontario, with two units identified as the CTFQBA’s headquarters. Additionally, two other addresses on the list were identified as a convenience store in Scarborough and a residential home in Markham.
In a December 2022 report, Safeguard Defenders identified open-source information from China pointing to two additional locations in Canada reportedly acting as Chinese police outposts. One was in Vancouver, while the location of the other was indicated as unknown in the report. However, an online post by a local police bureau in China lists a shopping mall address in Richmond, B.C., part of Metro Vancouver, as one of the bureau’s affiliated Chinese overseas police service centres, as first reported by The Epoch Times in February 2023.
Subsequently, in March 2023, RCMP in Quebec announced an investigation into two locations in the province, prompted by at least “15 serious tips“ regarding the presumed Chinese police stations.
Following widespread media coverage and facing mounting criticism, then-RCMP Deputy Commissioner Mike Duheme told MPs on March 2, 2023, that at least four of the alleged Chinese police stations had been shut down.
“Our understanding is that they’ve ceased, and we’re continuing investigation,” Mr. Duheme, currently the RCMP Commissioner, said while testifying before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.
CTFQBA has denied the allegations, issuing a statement last April saying that media reports about the organization were unfounded and defamatory.
The Epoch Times made various attempts to contact CTFQBA for comment but didn’t receive a reply.
Pro-Beijing Positions
During the Feb. 10 New Year celebration, a senior manager at CTFQBA highlighted the organization’s mission of “assisting Fuqing entrepreneurs and business people in Canada to enter the international market” and to “contribute to the economic prosperity and development of both China and Canada.”The CTFQBA has also played a key role in organizing various events and movements aligned with the Beijing regime.
This includes a rally held in Markham in August 2019, where the business association voiced support for the Chinese regime’s response to a pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong. Throughout the democracy movement, incidents of police brutality such as the excessive use of tear gas and rubber bullets were reported, accompanied by accusations of police raping a detained female protester.
In addition, the organization participated in organizing a protest on Parliament Hill on June 24, 2023. The event was advertised as marking the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Immigration Act, which restricted virtually all Chinese immigration to Canada. However, organizers held events ahead of the rally to urge Chinese communities to oppose legislation to create a foreign agent registry in Canada. Such a registry would increase transparency around the activities of individuals working on behalf of a foreign entity in Canada.
Weng Guoning, a permanent honorary president of CTFQBA, was among some 500 overseas delegates from Chinese organizations in over 130 countries who attended the 10th Conference for Friendship of Overseas Chinese Associations in Beijing in May 2023. The event aimed to promote the communist regime’s ideology, featuring a meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping and his inner circle.
Kathy Han contributed to this report
