Monday 20 / May / 2024
Washington: Two men have been arrested for allegedly operating a Chinese "secret police station," US prosecutors said on Monday.
The center was allegedly located in Manhattan's Chinatown neighborhood.
The two New York residents face charges of conspiring to act as agents of China's government without informing US authorities, as well as obstruction of justice.
"This prosecution reveals the Chinese government's flagrant violation of our nation's sovereignty by establishing a secret police station in the middle of New York City," Breon Peace, the top federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, said.
"We don't need or want a secret police station in our great city," he said.
In response, China's Foreign Ministry rejected the prosecutor's statement, saying that such secret police stations did not exist and that China maintains a policy of non-interference in other countries.
"China firmly opposes the US side's slandering, smearing, engaging in political manipulation, and maliciously concocting the so-called transnational repression narrative," ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters.
'Transnational repressions schemes' against Chinese expats
Prosecutors said one of the two men sought to persuade an individual considered a fugitive from China to return home. The individual had reported being harassed and threatened.
China's government in 2022 asked the alleged agent to help locate a California resident who was considered a pro-democracy activist, prosecutors said.
