ronya posted:

The most interesting element of this piece:

https://www.readingthechinadream.com/zhang-weiwei-on-color-revolutions.html

by Zhang Weiwei:

is that it doesn't mention capitalism at all; it is entirely about 西式民主 Western-style democracy being not adaptable to local conditions and prone to magnifying conflicts in a multicultural society:

The "Asian values" era has yet to leave us

i fly airplanes posted:

Christ. Even Singapore gave up on that trope.

D-Pad posted:

That is wild and is absolutely something where coming down like a shitton of bricks is very appropriate. That should not even be remotely tolerated and requires severe consequences beyond "we deported everybody working there"

Is it weird that it makes me much angrier than busting a chinese spy ring? Like spying is expected and part of the game but this is outside the "rules", even though traditional spying probably causes much more damage than this. Maybe the difference in reaction is spying is against the nation as a whole while this is against individuals that are under the protection of the nation?

quote:

Crime Affecting Chinese Citizens Overseas

Crime affecting Chinese citizens in neighboring countries is illustrated by the People’s Armed Police (PAP) joint armed patrols along the Mekong River. These patrols, which occur outside of China’s borders with police forces from Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand, have been underway since 2011. In March, these countries undertook the 115th joint Mekong River patrol involving 81 officers sailing over 680 kilometers, and including two Chinese law enforcement vessels from Yunnan Province (Ministry of Public Security, March 29). The deployment of PAP patrols has created a “pax sinica” on the Mekong River, which is important for PRC economic interests in neighboring countries (Asian Affairs, February 15, 2018).

The Mekong River is a vital geostrategic waterway for cross-border shipping as it runs through China, Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand, but the area suffers from significant crime including drug smuggling, arms trafficking, and piracy. In October 2011, the discovery of two deserted Chinese cargo ships carrying 920,000 amphetamine pills and the murder of 13 Chinese crew members triggered greater action by the PRC authorities. The culprit for these acts of murder and piracy was “Naw Kham,” an ethnic Burmese former officer in the Mong Tai Army of the late warlord Khun Sa, and his 60 to 100 gunmen known as the “Hawngleuk militia” based in eastern Shan State. The group patrolled the Mekong on speedboats trafficking drugs, and committing robbery, kidnapping, and murder without being interdicted by Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand authorities (The Irrawaddy, October 13, 2011).

Authorities targeted Naw Kham and his gang with Chinese and Lao police officers raiding locations in Laos, leading to his arrest in April 2012 (The Irrawaddy, May 11, 2012). Following his arrest, Naw Kham and his associates were sent to China and tried in Kunming, where they were convicted of the murder of the 13 Chinese sailors on the Mekong River, which highlighted the influence of Chinese authorities vis-à-vis its neighbors. In March 2013, Naw Kham and his colleagues were executed in Kunming by lethal injection, showing that the reach of PRC law enforcement is not only long, but also deadly (China Daily, March 1, 2013).

Overseas Crime Targeting Chinese Citizens in the PRC

In recent years, Chinese organized crime groups have exploited the PRC’s international economic expansion to increase their overseas presence (China Brief, March 25). This has driven PRC law enforcement agencies to pursue Chinese criminals in other jurisdictions. Key areas of this transnational organized crime include gambling and fraud targeting PRC citizens inside China. In April, authorities reported that in the past year they have destroyed 2,500 gambling platforms and over 1,900 illegal payment platforms and underground banks. These included criminal groups with revenue of over 1.6 billion yuan ($251 million) in Jilin and Heilongjiang Provinces, and 15 billion yuan ($2.3 billion) in Chongqing, Sichuan Province (Ministry of Public Security, April 1, 2022).

Over the past decade, the PRC has also been plagued by telecommunications and cyber fraud, perpetrated by Chinese gangs operating across Asia. Six of the ten alleged masterminds of telecom and cyber fraud who established bases in the Philippines, Cambodia, and Myanmar, allegedly recruited gang members from the PRC to solicit people in China for fraudulent investments and gambling (Ministry of Public Security, October 24, 2020). For China, the extent of economic loss from telecommunications fraud is huge, reportedly amounting to 35.37 billion yuan ($5.5 billion) in 2020 (Ministry of Public Security, June 22, 2021).

Law enforcement action against Chinese criminals overseas does not even have to involve leaving the country. The Public Security Bureau (PSB) in multiple provinces reportedly threatened fugitives in Myanmar that they would suspend pensions and medical coverage of their relatives in the PRC if they did not voluntarily return home to face trial (Reuters, June 2021).

Corruption – “Fox Hunt” and “Sky Net”

The PRC’s huge economic growth over the past two decades has resulted in systematic corruption and a large number of fugitives from justice. At the onset of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s tenure (2012-), the Ministry of Public Security launched “Fox Hunt” (猎狐,lie hu) for Chinese fugitives wanted for corruption. The driver of the “Fox Hunt” operations was the huge number of fugitive officials facing corruption charges as a result of Xi’s anti-corruption campaign. From 2012-2014, around 18,000 officials reportedly fled overseas taking over 800 billion yuan ($125 billion) with them, largely to Asia Pacific countries with large Chinese communities (China Daily, November 12, 2014).

Launched in 2015, “Sky Net” (天网,tian wang) involved a division of labor among multiple agencies. The State Supervisory Commission led the international pursuit of fugitives and stolen goods for duty-related crimes. The Ministry of Public Security carried out the “Fox Hunting” special operation to track down officials in hiding abroad. The People’s Bank of China, together with the Ministry of Public Security, worked to target offshore companies and underground banks that transfer illicit money overseas. Finally, the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate undertook judicial action against those apprehended for crimes (Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, March 3).

Both “Fox Hunt” and “Sky Net” are problematic for several reasons. First, the conviction rate for criminal charges in the PRC is reported to be 99.9 percent and only 30 percent of defendants are represented by lawyers, indicating insufficient legal protections for individuals and no presumption of innocence until proven guilty. The presumption of guilt is even greater in cases concerning politics, for instance, trials of dissidents. Countries with a system that provides legal rights for all individuals have great difficulty extraditing suspects to the PRC. This leads to the second problem, which is that many of the fugitives wanted by the PRC authorities may also be subject to politically-related arrest.

By 2015, the PRC had signed extradition treaties with 39 countries, judicial assistance treaties with 52 countries, and agreements for cooperation with 91 countries. In addition, the PRC had entered police cooperation with 189 countries and sent 62 police liaison officers to 36 Chinese embassies in 31 countries (China Daily, March 20, 2015). However, some countries where fugitives may have fled have either avoided signing extradition agreements with the PRC or have rescinded them following the introduction of the National Security Law to Hong Kong in 2020. These include Australia, Canada, Germany, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, the UK, and the United States.

The lack of formal extradition arrangements with so many countries has forced the PRC authorities to use alternative means to apprehend fugitives. “Persuasion” has become a common tactic, which human rights groups have called “involuntary returns.” Such returns are achieved by threats against family members in the PRC, directly approaching and intimidating the fugitive overseas, or outright kidnapping (Safeguard Defenders, January 18). Involuntary returns of Chinese nationals to the PRC comprise a mix of genuine criminal fugitives, officials who have fallen out of favor with the CCP leadership, and others pursued for their religious or political beliefs. The latter includes Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghurs from Xinjiang, Tibetans, and more recently, protesters from Hong Kong. The resultant lack of clarity regarding which cases relate to genuine criminality is worsened by the involvement of multiple PRC government agencies.

In January 2017, Chinese billionaire Xiao Jianhua, founder of the Tomorrow Group, was taken by a group of people from the Four Seasons Hotel in Hong Kong and has not been seen in public since (South China Morning Post (SCMP), January 31, 2017). There were multiple unconfirmed reports that Xiao may have been abducted by Ministry of State Security officers, possibly because of his close financial connections to senior PRC leaders. Similar concerns were raised in late 2015, when five Hong Kong booksellers linked to the Hong Kong publisher Mighty House, known for selling books critical of China’s leaders, disappeared and were later found to have been held by PRC authorities. All five later appeared in Mainland China and were reported as being under investigation for illegally delivering banned books to customers across the border. Swedish national Gui Minhai, the owner of the publishing house, was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for “illegally providing intelligence to overseas entities.” One of the imprisoned booksellers later claimed that his confession was coerced (SCMP, June 21, 2020).

ronya posted:

on the political side, the collapse of New Order Indonesia and disorder in Malaysia, plus the non-collapse of democratizing South Korea and Taiwan rather put paid to the notion that the region was politically too immature for responsible civil society

on the economic side, there was Alwyn Young's charge of TFP stagnation (observe that China, also, has faced TFP stagnation since the GFC; the 2008-2013 stimulus and 2014+ withdrawal of said stimulus have not shifted this) plus the 1997 AFC which, despite rapid recoveries, settled the question of whether the region's governance was so foresighted as to be able to see off all challengers

China does not, of course, consider any of these countries as peers any longer

Silver2195 posted:

I think your reaction is sensible. Spying is within the unwritten rules of international relations; a system of secret police abroad using threats to effectively abduct and censor people extraterritorialy is not!

I’m actually struggling to think of an example of another country that does or even did this kind of thing systemically. Though maybe this isn’t a moral distinction so much as not a lot of countries having the opportunity.

The story behind Safeguard Defenders goes back to 2009, the year when a small NGO called China Action was founded in Beijing by human rights activists Peter Dahlin from Sweden and Michael Caster from the U.S. and a small group of Chinese rights lawyers and other human rights defenders (HRD).

Its mission was to support China’s fledging lawyer community. It ran trainings and capacity building projects as well as provided direct support for legal interventions and other assistance to HRDs at risk.

It also established a string of legal aid centres across China, working with, and specializing in supporting, China’s frontline legal defenders, also called ‘barefoot’ or ‘citizen’ lawyers. These stations offered pro-bono legal aid in China’s smaller cities and to local communities. Cases often concerned the rampant abuse and violation of laws by local police and government.

China Action was shuttered in 2016 after Chinese authorities targeted it in a major crackdown and when many of its staff and partners were detained, disappeared or imprisoned, including Peter.

...

The foundation for Safeguard Defenders was laid in 2016, and was publicly launched in 2017. The organisation has inherited the mission of China Action, but with an expanded scope to support the survival and effectiveness of civil society and HRDs in some of Asia's most hostile environments, including China.

ronya posted:

the red notice controversy was when HRW began pushing back at high-profile red notices in ~2017: https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/09/25/interpol-address-chinas-red-notice-abuses

the creation of the "involuntary returns" programmes is earlier, however, dating to ~2014

ronya posted:

Given the decade in which he rose in the ranks, it would surprise me if he wasn't corrupt, but the fact that he was disappeared despite the obvious embarrassment of disappearing such a high-profile figure suggests power politics instead of a normal arrest

It might not be deeper than noting the widespread purge of the public security bureaus (of which Meng Hongwei was merely one head to roll) and replacement with Xi's faction allies: https://www.iris-france.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Asia-Focus-139.pdf

quote:

A Foxconn employee, who declined to be named, said that the factory was not doing enough to separate the positive cases in a timely manner. “I just want to work. I don’t want to be infected because there will be trouble for me to find a new job in the future,” the person said in a message on Douyin when reached by the Post.

The conversation was cut short when the person said she received a notice from her manager that she had received a positive Covid test result. She declined to answer further questions after getting the news.

quote:

现在很多人在争论中国的动态清零政策，说我们的政策有问题，导致我们的生意不好做。

错！你的格局太小，观点太低。

美国才3.3亿人口，我们以美国为例，美国9000多万的人感染了新冠病毒。美国国会报告显示，美国这9000多万的新冠病毒患者中，已经有1400万有明显的后遗症。有200-400万的人已经丧失了劳动力。

大家知道这意味着什么吗？想象一下，如果疫情再延期个5年，疫情再延期个10年，假设。意味着西方躺平政策下的西方世界的劳动力就会荡然无存。听懂了吗各位？没有人了！

所以各位，我们一定要什么？动态清零！

我只能说，足够愚昧才会躺平。现在我们一定不能躺平。我们一定要坚持什么？动态清零！听懂了我的话了吗？要让西方去躺平。因为疫情有严重的后遗症各位。所以我们是一定不能够躺平的。

作为一个普通的消费者，作为一个普通的国民，我们不要妄议国政。

体制内的人比我们聪明的多，比我们高级的多。

你根本没有那么大的画面，你根本没有那么大的胸怀。你也根本没有那么大的格局，你看不到那么多的山山水水。

所以，不要妄议国政。听话照做就好了，我们就赢了。

如果疫情再过十年，都不用我们打，全世界都趴下了。

A big flaming stink posted:

Can't understand that points he's making obviously, but I just think it's funny how the consultancy grift attaches to literally any popular policy consensus

droll posted:

Sorry am not following you. Can you please elaborate?

ronya posted:

In other news, multipolarity:

https://twitter.com/lingli_vienna/status/1580984401466310656

Scholz is visiting in two weeks. This is the flavour of the coverage: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202210/1277029.shtml

ronya posted:

Presented without comment:

https://twitter.com/violazhouyi/status/1590274958420475905

quote:

China is relying on 20 key parameters to guide officials on the ground as it eases the contentious Covid Zero policy.
Released on Friday, the measures detail what officials should be doing on everything from quarantine to testing, representing a sweeping pullback of the country’s punishing pandemic playbook.
The 20 are:

Cut isolation for close contacts to five days at a central facility and three days at home, down from 7+3;
No longer identify the close contacts of close contacts;
People leaving high-risk areas must spend seven days at home, rather than at a centralized quarantine facility;
Remove the “medium” risk category; only homes, workplaces and areas often frequented by someone infected will be deemed high-risk; all other areas are low-risk; high risk areas should mostly be confined to residential units or blocks, and cannot be extended at will;
Workers in high-risk positions exiting closed-loop operations must spend five days at home, down from seven days at home or in a centralized isolation facility;
Remove mass testing in most areas, with citywide tests given only when the source of infection is unknown;
Scrap circuit breaker bans for incoming flights and reduce pre-flight PCR testing to one from two;
Allow closed-loop systems to ease rules for business executives and sports stars;
Set cycle threshold values at less than 35 to diagnose Covid in new arrivals;
Cut quarantine for new arrivals to five days in a hotel and three at home, down from the previous 7+3;
Increase health care resources, including hospital beds;
Promote vaccine usage, especially booster shots for the elderly;
Stockpile medicine and equipment to treat Covid;
Determine the size of the population still at risk for Covid;
React quickly to outbreaks to reduce size and duration needed for pandemic control;
Halt excessive anti-Covid measures imposed by local governments;
Provide adequate supplies and necessary medical care for people in quarantine;
Improve pandemic control measures on school campuses;
Implement pandemic control measures in industrial parks to ensure smooth supply chain operations;
Arrange orderly departures for people who are stranded during lockdowns.