The two community centers suspected by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) to be Chinese “police stations” have ties to the communist regime in Beijing, our investigative office has found.
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The Chinese Family Service of Greater Montreal and the Sino-Quebec Center of the South Shore are suspected, like four other centers identified by Spanish NGO Safeguard Defenders elsewhere in the country, to be “police posts” on behalf of the Chinese authorities. The RCMP mentioned last week that citizens of the Chinese diaspora may face intimidation or threats from the Chinese communist regime in connection with these centers.
Allegations that the lawyer for the two centers formally rejected on Tuesday. The latter said in a statement they had learned “with amazement” that the investigation was being conducted and were ready to cooperate.
Various links
In recent weeks, we have identified several links between these community centers and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), both in Quebec and internationally:
- Until our report was published last week, the “Government of the People’s Republic of China” was listed on its website among the Greater Montreal Chinese Family Service partners alongside the governments of Quebec and Canada. . The mention has since been deleted.
- The two centers were also designated as service centers for overseas Chinese.
- In 2015, the director of the two centers and Councilor of Brossard, Xixi Li, met with the President of the Provincial Association of Overseas Chinese of Gansu Province, Fan Xiangqin, during a visit to China.
- At the same time, she met with a vice minister of the United Front Work Department in China.
- Ms. Li became the vice president of the Overseas Friendship Association of Gansu Province in China in 2018. According to several international reports, the Federation of Overseas Friendship Associations is subordinate to the United Front Work Department, a repressive wing of the CPP (see other text).
- In 2018, she was also personally invited by the Chinese Prime Minister to attend the celebrations surrounding China’s National Day, a mention that has since been deleted from the Center Sino-Québec de la Rive-Sud website.
Worries
Experts on the Chinese issue and representatives of groups fighting for democracy in China say they are concerned about this proximity between community centers in Montreal and the communist regime in Beijing.
“There are no reasons that could justify why the Chinese government is supporting a social service center in Montreal. This has nothing to do with China. One cannot help but wonder what the Chinese government’s real motivation is to invest resources in an organization that does not have a mandate to serve China’s interests,” said Charles Burton of the Macdonald Institute-Laurier and a former advisor to the Canadian Embassy in China.
“The Federation of Friendship Associations is clearly part of the Department of United Front Work (DTFU) operations. Confucius Institutes, Friendship Associations; all these so-called “soft” associations are actually the invisible face of the DTFU (…) It’s not just limited to Montreal or Brossard. There are other organizations like this one elsewhere that have questionable ties to the Chinese government. It raises suspicions,” said Cheuk Kwan, co-chair of the Toronto Association for China Democracy.
She denies
Through their lawyer, the two community centers refused to answer our questions about their apparent ties to China.
Last week, during a brief telephone interview, Xixi Li denied that she was close to the Chinese Communist Party. She also pointed out that her vice presidency of Gansu Province’s Overseas Friendship Association is “honorary” only.
“I was never involved. I never participated. I don’t know what they did,” she said, saying she didn’t know the unification could be linked to the Chinese Communist Party.
She also said she met the members of this association when they visited Montreal “around 2015.”
“We haven’t had contact with China with Covid for years. I haven’t returned to China in years…a long time,” she said.
– In collaboration with Yves Levesque
The United Front and Friendship Associations
The Department of United Front Work (DTFU) has been an international concern for some time.
It is a branch of the Chinese Communist Party used by Beijing in its foreign interference actions.
“Beijing uses the DTFU to quash criticism and infiltrate foreign political parties, diasporas, universities and multinational corporations. The DTFU’s importance to the Chinese Communist Party has increased in recent years under President Xi’s rule; ; In fact, 40,000 new employees were hired,” Public Safety Canada wrote on its website.
Other reports and expert testimonies have pointed to the DTFU’s ties to Chinese Friendship Associations as one of the tools in the DTFU’s arsenal against foreign interference.
This is particularly the case with a report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute published in 2020. Alarms have already been sounded.
“The United Front’s strategy encompasses a range of methods to influence overseas Chinese communities, foreign governments and other actors to take actions or positions conducive to Beijing’s favorable policies. A number of official and quasi-official entities carry out overseas activities directed or funded by the United Front, including Chinese government and military organizations, cultural and “friendship” associations,” the report said.
“The main groups of the united front include leading organizations (…) abroad, these are (…) associations of Chinese students and scholars and many friendship associations and Chinese hometowns abroad. By co-opting these organizations under the aegis of the United Front, the party seeks to shape the narrative and expand its influence abroad,” Lynette H. Ong, a professor of political science at the University of Toronto, also told the House Committee on Parliament in May 2021 China-Canada relations