Oregon’s FBI is reaching out to residents of Chinese descent in the Pacific Northwest to encourage them to report any harassment or stalking from the Chinese government in the wake of high-profile attempts in New York to silence critics.
The FBI has taken out ads this month in The Asian Reporter and Portland Chinese Times, urging people to report acts of transnational repression, which are efforts by foreign governments to prevent political dissent.
The advertisements ask: “Are you being harassed, stalked or threatened by a federal government? It could be transnational repression, which is ILLEGAL in the U.S.,” and provides the FBI’s phone number in Portland.
Kieran Ramsey, Oregon’s FBI special agent in charge, said the FBI has “specific concerns in the Northwest,” but declined to offer details.
In the last month, two Americans were arrested on suspicion of operating a secret Chinese police station in New York City. Separately, 44 Chinese officials were accused of enforcing Chinese laws on U.S. soil. Both are examples of the Chinese government’s effort to exert influence inside the United States, federal law enforcement officials say.
Earlier this year, U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., joined with members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to introduce a bill that would establish U.S. policy to hold foreign governments and individuals accountable when they stalk, intimidate, or assault people within the United States and U.S. citizens in foreign countries. The bill calls for a tip line to be created to report alleged transnational repression to the U.S. Department of Justice and federal Homeland Security Department and would require the U.S. President to submit a list to Congress of foreign individuals who should be sanctioned for “knowingly and unknowingly, engaging” in such repression.
FBI Director Christopher Wray last month sounded the alarm about the threat to U.S. security of counterintelligence and economic espionage from the government of China and the Chinese Communist Party.
Ramsey said cyberstalkers and blackmailers may be targeting Chinese dissidents, journalists or political opponents of the regime of Chinese President Xi Jinping who are here on asylum.
“We are aware of the things going on out there, and we want to do something about it,” he said. “We want to identify it, and we want to put a stop to it.”
Helen Ying, president of the Portland chapter of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance, which supports people of Chinese descent living in the area and guards their civil rights, said she hadn’t heard about the FBI’s outreach efforts in Oregon.
“I am curious,” she said.
The FBI ads are running this month in The Asian Reporter and weekly in Portland Chinese Times.
The FBI asks anyone with information about an alleged crime to contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI or the local Portland field office at 503-224-4181.
— Maxine Bernstein
Email mbernstein@oregonian.com; 503-221-8212
Follow on Twitter @maxoregonian
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