Above, China's President Xi Jinping is seen on September 15. Unsubstantiated media reports claim that Xi is under house arrest. Photo Credit: TASS

Written by: William Ging Wee Dere

The Western media is full of fake news and disinformation on China recently. More than usual, as the Communist Party of China prepares its 20th National Party Congress to start on October 16. For those who are familiar with the history of McCarthyism, the present atmosphere is reminiscing of the classical anti-communist red baiting engaged by the establishment politicians and media of that era.

Here are three recent events that come to mind.

1. Chinese police opens overseas stations to crackdown on citizens abroad

The Globe and Mail ran an article on September 21, 2022, that the Chinese police from the Fuzhou Public Security Bureau has opened three police “service stations” in the Greater Toronto Area. The article comes complete with self-induced speculation that the service stations are there to do evil. The G&M quotes the Safeguard Defenders that they will leave “Chinese residents abroad fully exposed to extra-legal targeting by the Chinese police, with little to none of the protection theoretically ensured under both national and international law.” It was the report by the Safeguard Defenders on September 12, “110 Overseas: Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild,” that induced conjectures from mainly the right-wing media like National Post, Fox, Epoch Times and G&M to attack China.

The Safeguard Defenders is part of the anti-China human rights industry based in Madrid. It is headed by a Swede, Peter Dahlin, who in a previous incarnation also founded the Chinese Urgent Action Working Group (CUAWG) which received funding from the EU and the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) which focuses on regime change of governments that are not to Washington’s liking. The Defenders is run by white westerners with a few anti-Communist overseas Chinese from Taiwan and elsewhere to research anti-China materials. It is akin to Adrian Zenz and the Washington based Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation.

Keith Lamb, Oxford Master on Contemporary Chinese Studies, wrote an exposé on the Defenders after it filed a complaint against China Global Television Network (CGTN) to the European Conseil supérieur de l'audiovisuel (CSA) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for "grave lies and distortions of facts” in its coverage of Adrian Zenz and Mamutjan Abudurehim. Lamb wrote “When it comes to Zenz's work these claims leveled at CGTN are stunning considering his non-peer-reviewed work has been found to be full of flagrant data abuse and conjecture.” Furthermore, “Zenz's academic-like reports create an illusion of authority which lays the foundations for silencing Western opposition to hostilities against China. This in turn gives the U.S. carte blanche to act undemocratically should it wish it instigate aggression against China, whose development challenges U.S. unipolarity.”

Let’s take a moment to deal with another piece of Xinjiang disinformation in the case of Mamutjan Abudurehim. The CGTN countered a CNN report on “missing children” in Xinjiang. Lamb wrote “Abudurehim's "missing" daughter, Muhlisa Mamut, is found to be living with her grandparents. Being naturally sad about being separated from her parents she cries. However, CNN doesn't release the full interview and neither does it allow Mandarin speakers to listen to what she says. Furthermore, this particular report doesn't address in any depth why Abudurehim will not return to China.”

Now getting back to the G&M article which is purely based on the September 12, 2022 paper by the Safeguard Defenders. The Chinese Police Service opened three “110 services” to serve Chinese students and other Chinese citizens living in the Toronto area which contains a large Chinese population. The 110 service is like the 911 service in Canada. Chinese citizens abroad can apply to the service to renew their driver’s license, ID papers, lost documents and other administrative needs. The service is managed by the Fuzhou Public Security Bureau. The article tried to even get the RCMP to back its claim of Chinese wrong-doing but the RCMP spokesperson said the force would not comment on “uncorroborated media reports or statements.” She added foreign police officers, including members of China’s Ministry of Public Security, “can be sent to Canada as part of diplomatic or consular missions, performing duties which are representational or in a liaison capacity.”

In response to the sensational mainstream media articles that China has opened “police stations” in Canada, the Chinese Canadian media clarified the 110 service in a September 28 article. According to this article, “At present, there are more than 4.3 million overseas Chinese of Fuzhou (minority) nationality all over the world. The Fuzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau has set up a special seat for the overseas 110 alarm service desk to accept the telephone alarm and help service of overseas Chinese of Fuzhou nationality.” Thirty 110 service stations opened in 21 countries to serve overseas Chinese over the last two years when the Covid-19 Pandemic stranded thousands of Chinese citizens around the world when their documents expired. By the way, the US FBI has 60 fully operational stations with over 250 agents stationed around the world, including one in Ottawa. We’ve read about the American renditioning of political prisoners.

Apart from the anecdote given in the G&M article on the 110 service, here’s a more understandable one from the Chinese Canadian media:

Here is the story of Ms. Jiang, stranded in the US.

"Comrade police, my daughter has been lost!" On July 10, a trans-ocean call from Ms. Jiang, an American overseas Chinese, quickly tightened the nerves of the "Overseas 110" police on duty.

It turned out that Ms. Jiang's daughter, Xiao Jiang (pseudonym), who was staying at her grandma's house in Changle District, Fuzhou City, ran away from home. "I didn't answer the phone, and I didn't reply to the message. It's been 14 hours!" In a panic, Ms. Jiang called the "Overseas 110" emergency number.

On the other end of the phone, a voice with a slight Fuzhou accent sounded: "Hello, what can I do for you?" "It was past 4 am Beijing time at that time. I didn't expect the police to answer the call. My Hope instantly ignited in my heart!" Ms. Jiang said, she did not expect that at 6 o'clock in the afternoon that day, the police sent Xiao Jiang back to her grandmother's house safely.

So, what can we think of the thrill-seeking articles in the mainstream media based on some dubious report by Safeguard Defenders? One would expect so-called respectable media like the Globe and Mail to do a reality check on disinformation circulated by the anti-China human rights industry before splashing sensationalist headlines to alarm people about the evil actions of Communist China here in Canada.

2. Military coup overthrows Chinese President Xi Jinping.

This story circulated in western social media for a week at the end of September and picked up by some of the mainstream press. Newsweek quotes Gordon Chang, the American born author of The Coming Collapse of China as its authority on the Chinese “coup.” Chang is a darling of the anti-China western media who has advised the US National Intelligence Council, the CIA, the US State Department, and the US Defense Department.

Newsweek quotes from Chang’s Tweet, "whatever happened inside the #Chinese military during the last three days—evidently something unusual occurred—tells us there is turbulence inside the senior #CCP leadership." As evidence, Chang also mentioned a widely shared video posted on Twitter to show “a line of military vehicles up to 80 kilometers long heading into Beijing amid reports of a military coup.” Then Newsweek quotes Chang as saying, "There's been a lot of smoke, that says there is a fire somewhere. We don't think that there has actually been a coup, but at this point there have been some extremely troubling developments at the top of the Communist Party as well as the top of the People's Liberation Army, which reports to the party, so something is terribly wrong." Without any evidence this story stuck around for a week.

Alex Lo of the South China Morning Post debunked this story and Chang’s conjectures. Regarding Chang’s evidence of a coup that “60 percent of flights were canceled” in one day, Lo went to hard evidence, “according to the Chinese financial news site, yicai.com, the cancellation rates of the preceding three weeks were respectively 60.1 per cent, 69 per cent and 64.1 per cent.” Air Canada alone cancelled 9,500 flights this summer. As for the 80km long convoy, Lo wrote that “British tech company (Logically) that specialises in fact-checking and analysing disinformation, has determined that the video clip of a military convoy was actually taken from last year.”

3. “Eternal Spring,” Canada’s Pick for International Feature Oscar

In the fine tradition of Hollywood anti-Communist films, Canada follows suit with the animated “documentary” film “Eternal Spring,” featuring the banned cult Falun Gong breaking into a Chinese TV station attempting to overthrow the government. Through watching the two minute long trailer, with the ominous music and the repressive atmosphere of persecution evident in the dark images, it is effective to make someone easily feel the sense of dread in an “oppressive” China. It won the 2022 Hot Docs Audience Award. The film is now being promoted by Telefilm Canada as this country’s Oscar nomination for best international feature.

Falun Gong was founded in China in the early 1990’s. Its founder Li Hongzhi believes himself to be a descendent of space aliens who can walk through walls and make himself invisible. He pushes that modern science and race-mixing as well as homosexuality will destroy humanity. His followers opposed modern medical practices which resulted in many unable to battle sickness. This was one of the reasons why the cult is banned in China. Li moved to the US and built his world headquarters in Upper State New York on a 400-acre compound near Deerpark. Falun Gong is extreme right wing politically and associates with QAnon conspirators to bring Donald Trump back to power. Through its publication, Epoch Times and video production New Tang Dynasty (NTD) under the umbrella of Epoch Media Group, the most vile propaganda against China, such organ harvesting, Uygur genocide, etc. is disseminated.

Even the New York Times described the Epoch Times as a “leading purveyor of right-wing misinformation” that is “pushing dangerous conspiracy theories” with a “willingness to feed the online fever swamps of the far right.” Falun Gong now applies its full weight of propaganda to the disinformation churned out by the Uygur genocide industry.

It’s no wonder that the Falun Gong and its mouth-piece Epoch Times are in vogue with the Canadian media and the cultural crowd.

Eternal Spring may well win the Oscar in 2023. After a decade of demonization of China, the cultural elite feels that the general Canadian mentality is ripe to absorb mass culture about the “repressive and oppressive authoritarian” Chinese regime. We can expect to see more Sinophobic films featuring Chinese as villains in the tradition of painting an enemy black - Muslims in the 2000’s, Japanese in the 1980’s, Soviets during the Cold War and all the way back to the Native “Indians” in the golden days of Hollywood.

Editor’s note: The Canada Files has spent nearly three years doing critical investigative reporting on Canada's imperialist foreign policy. We’ve established a clear track record of exposing the truth Canada's political establishment hides from you. Currently we are at $678 CAD per month in support. There's so much more we can do, but only with your financial support.

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William Ging Wee Dere is a member of The Canada Files’ Advisory Board. He is the author of the award-winning “Being Chinese in Canada, The Struggle for Identity, Redress and Belonging.” (Douglas & McIntyre, 2019). He was a political organizer and a leading activist in the 2-decade movement for redress of the Chinese Head Tax and Exclusion Act. He is a member of the Progressive Chinese of Quebec.

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