Why are Chinese police carrying out law enforcement on Canadian soil?! Our search for answers continues…

You may have heard that there are inexplicably three Chinese police stations operating in the Greater Toronto Area — two in Markham and one in Scarborough. Media outlets ranging from The Globe and Mail to the New York Post recently ran stories on this disturbing situation.

We obtained the address of one Markham station and paid a visit, but either nobody was there that day or they wouldn’t come to the door. That’s too bad, because according to a report by Safeguard Defenders, a human rights watchdog, China has actually opened dozens of overseas police service stations in about 30 nations around the globe in order to “monitor” its citizens living abroad.

Safeguard Defenders notes in a report that: “These operations eschew official bilateral police and judicial cooperation and violate the international rule of law, and may violate the territorial integrity in third countries involved in setting up a parallel policing mechanism using illegal methods.”

The ostensible policy reason for these police stations on Canadian soil is to allow China extra tools to combat fraud by its citizens living overseas. The Safeguard Defenders report details these police forces have been responsible for some 230,000 Chinese nationals being “persuaded to return” to China to “voluntarily” face criminal prosecution.

The report also goes on to state that external police stations have been used to enhance China’s overseas law enforcement capabilities in possible violation of international law. Alarmingly, there have been potential human rights abuses, including using harassment and intimidation methods against detainees. Surprising?

Regardless, given the human rights record of communist China, is anyone fine with this – that Beijing is running its own police service on Canadian soil? And we ponder: would China allow Western law enforcement agencies to set up shop on Chinese soil?

Incidentally, we reached out to the Toronto Police Service to get its take on this situation; a TPS representative suggested we reach out to Interpol Canada instead. Meanwhile, York Regional Police Service said our queries would be best answered by the RCMP.

So we did indeed reach out to the media relations departments of Interpol and the RCMP, only to be met with silence. So it was we decided to visit a Toronto detachment of the RCMP once our emails went unanswered for an entire week.

We were met by a friendly staff sergeant who was unaware of the Chinese police carrying out duties in Canada. But he gave us the contact email of yet another media relations representative; she said she was forwarding our queries to someone else who might actually know the answers. Hopefully we will receive a reply at some point.

For what it’s worth, here are our questions:

1. Do you know which department of government signed off on the foreign police operating on Canadian soil?

2. Do you know the addresses of the other two stations?

3. There are human rights groups voicing concerns about coercive tactics being used by the Chinese police to convince its citizens to return to China. Are you concerned about this as well?

4. What actual powers do the Chinese police have when policing on Canadian soil?

In any event, the presence of Chinese police in Canada is an outrage, regardless of the ostensible policy reason. And if you are as outraged as we are, please sign our petition at www.KickThemOut.ca. Once we get a sizeable number of signatures, we shall deliver this petition to whichever entity signed off on this program.

And stay tuned to Rebel News as we get to the bottom of a situation that is equal parts disturbing and scandalous.

David Menzies

Mission Specialist

David “The Menzoid” Menzies is the Rebel News "Mission Specialist." The Menzoid is equal parts outrageous and irreverent as he dares to ask the type of questions those in the Media Party would rather not ponder.

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