A report released in September revealed emerging evidence which suggests that, in recent years, China may have been violating international law by secretly sending their police to 25 cities in 21 countries, setting up more than 50 illegal “Overseas Police Service Stations” across five continents.
These findings came from the Spanish NGO “Safeguard Defenders” in their report titled: “110 Overseas: Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild.”
Now, the Dutch Government has embarked on an investigation into reports that at least two Chinese stations may be in illegal operation in the Netherlands..
Overseas activity
Amsterdam and Rotterdam are the two Dutch cities where reports say illegal Chinese police stations may be in operation.
The Dutch Ministry’s spokesperson Maxime Hovenkamp stated:
“We are now investigating as a ministry what is going on with the centres, and when we have more intel about it we can determine the appropriate action.”
Hovenkamp went on to say:
“What is correct is that the Chinese government never informed us about the centres via diplomatic channels so that makes them illegal to begin with.”
The Foreign Minister of Netherlands Wopke Hoekstra tweeted on Wednesday evening, saying, “For the sake of clarity: foreign interference in our constitutional state is unacceptable.”
One Chinese “police station” discovered in Dublin has already been ordered to “close and cease operations” by the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, who said no Chinese authorities had asked for permission to establish it.
An MP in the UK has also announced they will be holding a session in Parliament next month to “take evidence from those who produced this important report into illegal Chinese police stations operating in the UK.”
According to the investigation being carried out by Dutch news outlets, RTL Nieuws and Follow the Money, both the Amsterdam- and Rotterdam-based “overseas service stations” were seeminly in place to help Chinese nationals with administrative purposes, but there were also reports of the centres being used for other purposes such as locating and threatening Chinese overseas nationals.
The Chinese Embassy in the Netherlands has responded to say they were unaware of the existence of such stations.
According to the news outlets, the police station in Amsterdam was being run by former police officers from the Lishui, Qingtian force, whereas the one in Rotterdam was being run by a former member of the Chinese military.
Wang Jingyu (who had previously been critical on social media about the regime in Beijing and now has been granted asylum in the Netherlands) said the Rotterdam centre contacted him immediately.
“They asked me to go back to China to sort out my problems,” said Wang Jingyu, adding that: “They also told me to think of my parents.”
He also said he received threatening calls and messages including one that said “I’m going to kill you” accompanied by a photo of a gun.
“Pressuring opponents, maneuvering their own people into Dutch politics and more. These are the activities of at least two illegal Chinese police stations stationed in our country,” tweeted Dutch investigative journalists at Follow the Money on Tuesday.
“Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild”
Safeguard Defenders (the Spanish human rights organisation behind the September “110 Overseas: Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild” report) uncovered evidence that indicates police in China have used “Overseas Police Service Stations” to run “persuasion to return” operations in foreign countries, some of which are in Europe.
The report outlines how China claims its “persuasion to return” campaign has successfully returned over 200,000 suspects of fraud and telecom fraud back to China between April 2021 and July 2022.
According to the report, this campaign is part of broader “Involuntary Returns” operations, which involves activities such as directly contacting targets overseas either online or through agents/proxies or using targets families back in China to “encourage” them to return.
The report reveals these “Overseas Police Service Centers” may be in operation in many major cities across the world, including London, Milan, Rome, Vienna, New York, Toronto, Paris, Tokyo, Madrid, Stockholm, Prague, Budapest, and more.
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Correction: This article (including the title and subtitle and subheadings) has been entirely reworked, refocused and shortened substantially (including content and overall message) to solely focus on the Safeguard Defenders’ report and recent reported investigation in the Netherlands to avoid any possible misunderstanding or unfair assumptions, generally, or in relation to individuals, organisations, countries or intergovernmental organisations.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed here by the authors are their own, not those of Impakter.com — In the Featured Photo: Chinese police car. Featured Photo Credit: barockschloss/Flickr
