On March 10, the federal government of Canada announced a public consultation on establishing a foreign influence transparency registry.
Hong Kong Watch Canada welcomed the idea. However, since consulting the public would take a few years to form legislation, the human rights group urged the Canadian government to set up an independent reporting hotline first. The group stated an urgent need for a hotline to prevent any suspected agents of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from continuing to intimidate Hongkongers in Canada.
Public Safety Canada began a public consultation on the foreign influence transparency registry on March 10.
The Canadian authorities are carrying out relevant legislation because of the regime interfering in Canada’s 2019 and 2021 elections. Beijing government and agents pose serious threats
Katherine Leung, a policy adviser of Hong Kong Watch and assistant to a former member of Congress, pointed out that in early November 2021, Sen. Leo Housakos, supervisory sponsor of Hong Kong, had proposed the S-237 Act.
The bill emphasizes the need for the Canadian federal government to set up a registry of foreign government agents to identify and counter foreign agents in Canada, posing an increasingly serious threat to Canadian nationals.
The bill requires foreign government agents to submit declaration forms. If a declarant makes false statements in the declaration, they are subject to being fined or imprisoned to deter threats and thus protect Canada’s people.
Leung believes that the S-237 Act is already the best solution. Hong Kong Watch Canada takes responsibility for protecting human rights and freedoms in Hong Kong. It has never been absent from the topic discussion and will continue actively to participate in the consultation promoted by the Canadian government.
The human rights group stated that the CCP had been intimidating Hongkongers in Canada in various forms in recent years.
Multiple media outlets revealed that the CCP’s Overseas Police Department has been operating in many Canadian cities, deeply disturbing the Chinese people in Canada, especially Hong Kong people who have migrated to the local areas.
In October 2022, when Aileen Calverley, co-founder, and trustee of Hong Kong Watch, attended the Canada-People’s Republic of China Relations (CACN) hearing, she asked the Canadian government to legislate on the foreign agents’ registry against the CCP’s Overseas Police Department.
Report Hotline is The Fastest Temporary Solution
Hong Kong Watch Canada mentioned receiving many assistance requests from Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary. Due to political differences, the people needing assistance have received anonymous threats and intimidation by pro-China individuals.Some people had to report to the Royal Canadian Police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Agency. Unfortunately, their cases were only filed as complaints.
Katherine Leung told The Epoch Times that people who have received threats in the Hong Kong-Canadian community are not just active political members or figures. Hongkongers with little or no political involvement, such as immigration consultants, travel agents, and community members, are also affected.
Other than receiving messages asking them to stop their political acts, some people also received videos of beheading that terrorist organizations had used.
Life Threat Victims to Speak to Canadian Congress
Hong Kong Watch Canada will arrange for affected and intimidated migrants to attend a closed-door round-table meeting held in Ottawa at the end of March. The conference will ensure attendees can state their case to the Canadian federal government and Congress.A poll conducted by local polling agency Nanos Research to conduct a poll from Feb. 26 to March 1, 2023, showed that over 90 percent of Canadians are worried about Beijing’s interference in Canadian society.
Of the interviewees, 59 percent are worried, while 32 percent said they are “quite worried.”
Regarding Canada’s protection of the country from foreign interference, 15 percent of the respondents said the government’s performance was satisfactory, while only 13 percent thought the government did “an excellent job.”
On the contrary, people who thought the government was doing a poor job said that he, like Canadians, they worried about interference from the Chinese regime and other foreign governments.
However, Trudeau pointed out that the government had already introduced a system in 2015 to protect Canada’s public institutions from foreign interference and improve their ability to detect, prevent and counter those attempts.
However, a poll released by Nanos Research in December 2022 also showed that 88 percent of Canadians supported establishing a foreign agent registry, exposing people who work for foreign governments, trying to infiltrate Canadian politics, and increasing transparency.
In 2021, House of Commons Conservative Party member Kenny Chiu proposed the Registration of Foreign Influences Act. He hoped the government would build a system to monitor the activities of foreign government agents. Chiu, therefore, was labeled as anti-China.
Later, the Canadian Security Intelligence Agency (CSIS) and the Communications Security Agency (CSE) confirmed with the Conservative Party that during the 2021 federal election, 13 electoral districts had become the target of foreign forces in the Chinese-based Toronto and Greater Vancouver areas.
There are Conservative Party candidates in a total of 13 Conservative Party candidates of electoral districts who became the target of foreign interference.
It included specific election campaigns funded by foreign governments, illegal advertising, and removing the Conservative Party’s campaign news on WeChat.
During the election, many posts on WeChat falsely accused the Conservative Party of being anti-China and attacked the Conservative Party candidates, including Kenny Chiu.
In an interview with The Epoch Times in 2021, Kenny Chiu said that pro-communists attacked him fiercely via social media posts, radio comments, and online articles during the election.
Many attacks distorted the content of Chiu’s proposed foreign influence registration bill.
Canadian Police Close CCP Illegal Police Stations in Canada
Moreover, the illegal overseas police stations set up by the Chinese government in Canada are also notorious.Among them, the Canadian police announced on March 2, 2023, that they had closed four illegal police stations set up by the Chinese Communist Party; and the Chinese embassy officials would always complain whenever the Canadian police took action.
The Canadian Mounted Police Commissioners revealed earlier that they found four unofficial overseas police stations of the Chinese government in the country, three of which are in Toronto and one in Vancouver.
Xi Jinping Threatened Trudeau
During the G-20 summit on Nov. 15, 2022, Trudeau had a 10-minute conversation with CCP leader Xi Jinping.At the time, the Canadian intelligence agency reported to Trudeau and his cabinet members the interference from China, which included the 2019 federal election.
The Beijing government funded at least 11 candidates, including the office of an Ontario provincial councilor, allocating 250,000 Canadian dollars to the candidate.
The agency also reported that the Chinese Consulate in Toronto orchestrated it.
The CCP also sent agents into the office of Congress members in an attempt to bribe former Canadian officials to influence the direction of Canadian policy. The CCP also carried out defamatory attacks on politicians regarded as opposition to their interests.
Xi Jinping snapped at Trudeau the following day that he should not have told the media the content of their meeting and threatened the prime minister with “unpredicted consequences if he continued to be disrespectful.”
The CCP leader also called Trudeau “naive” as he walked away.
