Friday 18 November 2022 03:05 PM FBI director concerned about secret Chinese police stations in the US trends now
The FBI is deeply concerned about the Chinese government setting up unauthorized 'police stations' in US cities to possibly track and harass dissidents living abroad, FBI Director Christopher Wray told lawmakers on Thursday.
'I'm very concerned about this. We are aware of the existence of these stations,' Wray told a Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing.
Wray declined to detail the FBI's investigative steps on the issue, adding: 'But to me, it is outrageous to think that the Chinese police would attempt to set up shop, you know, in New York, let's say, without proper coordination.
'It violates sovereignty and circumvents standard judicial and law enforcement cooperation processes,' he added.
The existence of the so-called police stations, including one in a nondescript building above a ramen shop in Manhattan, was revealed in a September report from Safeguard Defenders, a Europe-based human rights organization.
Last month, DailyMail.com visited the Manhattan station on East Broadway, which was closed. The outpost is next to an acupuncturist, where a receptionist was surprised to hear it was a secret police station.
FBI Director Christopher Wray told lawmakers on Thursday he is deeply concerned about the Chinese government setting up unauthorized 'police stations' in US cities
A Chinese 'police station' operated by the Fuzhou Public Security Bureau opened on this block in lower Manhattan in February. The neighborhood is known as Little Fuzhou
According to Chinese-language media reports, the Manhattan station opened on February 15 as a branch of the Fuzhou Public Security Bureau, to 'let overseas Chinese feel the care and love from the motherland.'
Fuzhou is the capital of southeastern China's Fujian province. The neighborhood the New York station is located in is known as Little Fuzhou, an ethnic enclave within the larger Chinatown, with many immigrants from the region.
Like many of its police stations around the world, the New York site is promoted as a place to assist Chinese nationals with services such as driver's license tests.
But Safeguard Defenders raised concerns that the network of overseas stations has been used to monitor and harass dissidents who fled China, and to pressure them to return to their homeland.
The report described cases in which Chinese expatriates were put on video calls with officials in China, as well as their own family members, and warned of consequences for their family remaining in China if they failed to return.
It is part of a sweeping program known in Beijing as 'Operation Fox Hunt' involving extra-judicial repatriation squads that clandestinely attempt to force expatriates to return to
