CCP Ramps Up Use of Foreigners to Interfere With Falun Gong in Canada: Updated Report

The Chinese Embassy in Ottawa in a file photo. The Canadian Press/Sean Kilpatrick

The Chinese regime has increasingly used non-Chinese individuals to surveil and interfere with Falun Gong practitioners in Canada, according to an updated report detailing how the persecution of the practice extends beyond China’s borders.

“In recent years, non-Chinese individuals have been identified in assaults against Falun Gong practitioners in public places. The ethnic appearance of the assailants has changed, but the patterns of assault have remained constant over the past 25 years,” the Falun Dafa Association of Canada (FDAC) said in the report.

The 143-page report, initially released in October 2023, highlights new incidents of influence and surveillance targeting Falun Gong adherents who have fled overseas.

The report details several instances where the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has attempted to use non-Chinese individuals to monitor or intimidate Falun Gong practitioners during their activities in Canada.

It cites the example of a Canadian freelance reporter who had worked with the Chinese state media Xinhua News for over two years before leaving in 2012 due to repeatedly being asked to document dissident activities and collect names of attendees at Falun Gong press conferences.

Falun Gong practitioners holding peaceful protests outside Chinese embassies and consulates risk being photographed, the report says. The photos and personal information gathered are often used by the regime to intimidate them, according to the report.

In an example from July 2022, Falun Gong practitioners Mary Kovacks and Kathy Gillis reported being photographed by a middle-aged Caucasian male while they were meditating across the street from the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa. When confronted, the man responded with verbal abuse and accused them of not belonging in Canada, despite both being Canadian-born citizens of Caucasian descent.

In some cases, physical violence has been inflicted on Falun Gong practitioners.

FDAC cited an incident on April 27, 2022, where a Caucasian man vandalized the banners being used by Falun Gong practitioners at Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto. When an elderly practitioner, Shuliang Ren, attempted to stop him, the man started choking Ren and did not release his hold until a bystander intervened.

“The CCP’s foreign influence is clandestine and deceptive. Non-Chinese Canadians have been recruited to serve as agents of the CCP as a camouflage to monitor Falun Gong activities and carry out surveillance of practitioners,” FDAC said.

The updated FDAC report was released ahead of the 25th anniversary of the CCP’s persecution of the practice, which began on July 20, 1999. The organization plans to submit the report to the Foreign Interference Commission, which is investigating allegations of China’s interference in Canadian electoral and democratic processes and targeting Canadian MPs and critics of the communist regime.

Adherents of Falun Gong—a spiritual practice rooted in Buddhist traditions—have faced torture, forced labour, physical and sexual abuse, and even live organ harvesting at the hands of the CCP since the regime initiated a persecution campaign in July 1999. The CCP viewed Falun Gong’s belief in divinity and morality as counter to its atheist ideology and saw the practice’s popularity as a threat to its authoritarian rule in China.