The Truth about China’s Secret Police Stations

Watch a video recording of this article here: https://youtu.be/2to5uZdktAU

I’ve been asked many times for my opinion on these so-called “Secret Chinese police stations” and my answer has always been the same, I can’t say what they are or aren’t because I’m in China and I’ve never set foot into one of them. But then I found that, with just a little research, I can form an opinion on them. I’d like to thank Kevin Wayne, one of my regular followers and commentors for pushing me to start the research

I’ve always thought it was just another sensationalist series of reports designed by Western media, particularly in the US to denigrate China. I was wrong — it’s worse. What I found is quite shocking but hasn’t surprised me at all.

In order to tell the story of how these so-called police stations came into existence, we need to go back a few years:

Back in 2016, a human rights activist and former Swedish government employee, was arrested in China, he was on his way to the airport to catch a flight to Thailand but was picked up by Chinese police and held for 23 days. His name is Peter Dahlin.

After a public confession that he had violated Chinese law and had caused harm to the Chinese people he was released and deported.

Fast forward to today, we find Peter Dahlin’s name behind all sorts of anti-China initiatives. For example he lodged a formal complaint against CGTN in 2021 related to CGTN’s portrayal of Adrian Zenz and others in connection with Xinjiang, a complaint that went nowhere!

I’ve never found CGTN, or any other Chinese media to tell a lie, if they don’t want to tell us something they won’t say it. So I have a tendency to believe what they say and I strongly urge you, if you want to know what kind of person Dahlin is, then please read the link I’ve provided to the CGTN report.

Chinese media told the world in 2020 that Miles Guo was a criminal and he’s now in a US prison, Chinese media said Wang Lijiang was a fraud and he’s now had his assets seized by an Australian court and his visa application denied because of fraud — when you start seeing these, happen, you start getting the idea — Western media love making sensational stories and sadly, the public lap them up.

Even though Chinese media tells us these stories are untrue and always, the truth comes out later, it’s usually too late, the damage is done.

Dahlin, after leaving China, went on to found an NGO called Safeguard Defenders. And it was Safeguard Defenders, which launched a report early last year called “Patrol and Persuade” telling the world of all these “secret police stations”.

Usually, at this point, I’d say, if the Chinese media say they aren’t police stations, then they aren’t police stations but this time, I’m not going to. What I’m going to say is: British media says they aren’t police stations supported by US Academia. the Guardian publishing a report that seems well-balanced.

There is a department of Yale Law School which the Guardian cites. This department, the Paul Tsai China Centre of Yale did in-depth research on the Safeguard Defender’s report.

Unfortunately, nowadays, most journalists don’t do what Amy Hawkins of the Guardian did they usually repeat, rehash and amplify a story about China because it increases clicks and keeps the advertising rolling in. Amy Hawkins didn’t do that, she cited Jeremy Daum, a Senior Fellow of Yale Law school who dissected the Safeguard Defender report. So this time, it isn’t China’s media defending China, this is Yale University.

Professor Daum states the sites do not operate on diplomatic premises which means their staff who would be insulated from local laws with diplomatic immunity don’t get that protection. He says, they are not secret at all but actively advertise the services they offer. He also mentions factual errors, contextual errors. He criticises the author’s “recklessness with quotations and citations” and accuses the author of “gross hyperbole”. He states, these are not police stations, there are no police officers working in any of them and any police activities emanating from them are carried out in China.

He cites one example in Mozambique where an employer there sought to have a Chinese employee arrested after the employee embezzled money and returned to China.

I will add one thing to Professor Daum’s already damning paper and it’s this: the the Safeguard Defenders report confirms that several countries in Europe, Asia and Africa have set up these “secret” stations: “in explicit agreement with the host country” which seems a very strange way to hide a secret!

Let’s look at what they do: personally, I’ve legitimately and quite legally decided to stay in China. How can I transfer my apartment to my daughter’s name, how can I renew my driving licence or organise my health insurance, what happens if a family member dies and there are probate issues to attend to?

These are not police matters; they aren’t the concern of Federal government or the state government so there’s nothing I can do except go back to Australia to handle them. If the State government where I used live had an office in Guangzhou, and advertises these services, I’d be going there to do it and that’s exactly what these offices are doing. Advertising services they offer to help people with administrative affairs at home.

Now, there’s the allegations of coercion, let’s for a moment, imagine, if I had run away from Australia with millions of the government’s or my company’s money; would the police go to my ex-wife or my adult daughter who still live in Australia and make enquiries — of course they would — if they say, we’re not in touch with him anymore but are aware I’m in China, what would the police say?

They’d say, if he gets in touch with you, we want to know about it (they could also have a court order to monitor their communications in case I do) and they’d also say, if he does contact you, you should ask him to contact us so we can resolve this matter and encourage him to come home and face the music. That’s the coercion levels Australia would take, I very much doubt the Chinese police would do anything differently. I know for a fact the British police do because I’ve been one and I’ve done it!

the Defender Safeguard report suggests these “secret” police stations are in 53 countries. What I think we need to do now, is wait a while. Let’s see how many convictions there are for breaking US laws. See how many other countries go to these sites and start arresting people.

I may be wrong, and time will tell, but I strongly suspect there will be a quiet dropping of the charges against the two people arrested in New York City, Lu Jianwang, and Chen Jinping and we’ll hear no more about it.

Whatever damage to China’s reputation has been caused by this, we can be assured there won’t be any apologies and it’s highly unlikely there will be any retractions printed in mainstream media.

The objective is to denigrate China in the eyes of US citizens and, unfortunately, their objectives are achieved. I’ll finish this with a link to Global Times’ Hu Xijin who has just put out a short video, he had a few short words to say about Safeguard Defenders and that is: Safeguard Defenders is lying through its teeth. It’s very hard to disagree with that when you read what Yale University has said about the same issue.