{"id":71145,"date":"2023-05-15T17:12:15","date_gmt":"2023-05-15T22:12:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.jackjia.com\/?p=71145"},"modified":"2023-05-15T17:12:40","modified_gmt":"2023-05-15T22:12:40","slug":"20230515-%e5%a4%9a%e4%bc%a6%e5%a4%9a%e5%b8%82%e9%95%bf%e5%80%99%e9%80%89%e4%ba%ba%e9%82%b9%e8%87%b3%e8%95%99%e4%bc%9a%e8%a7%81%e4%b8%8e%e4%b8%ad%e5%9b%bd%e7%bb%93%e7%9b%9f%e5%9b%a2%e4%bd%93","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.jackjia.com\/?p=71145","title":{"rendered":"20230515\/\u591a\u4f26\u591a\u5e02\u957f\u5019\u9009\u4eba\u90b9\u81f3\u8559\u4f1a\u89c1\u4e0e\u4e2d\u56fd\u7ed3\u76df\u56e2\u4f53"},"content":{"rendered":"

Toronto mayoral candidate Olivia Chow meets with group aligned with China<\/strong><\/p>\n

A Chow supporter says such meetings are a ‘necessary evil’ to reach Chinese immigrants, while another cautions ‘not to jump into any conclusion’<\/p>\n

Author of the article:Tom Blackwell
\nPublished May 15, 2023<\/p>\n

Olivia Chow has generally not been a close friend of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).<\/p>\n

The veteran NDP politician has in the past organized events defending democracy activists in Hong Kong, was among a handful of MPs who stood in the House of Commons and commemorated the Tiananmen Square massacre and attended Tiananmen vigils.<\/p>\n

But the leading contender in Toronto\u2019s mayoral byelection is raising some eyebrows after speaking to and being welcomed with a gift from a group that has aligned itself repeatedly with the Chinese government and some of its most controversial policies.<\/p>\n

The Council of Newcomer Organizations, founded by former Liberal MP Geng Tan, claims its goal is to unite \u201call Canadian ethnic communities\u201d and has received $160,000 in funds from federal departments over the years.<\/p>\n

But it has also issued public statements harshly criticizing pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong \u2013 before that movement was all but crushed by Beijing \u2013 and decrying a parliamentary motion in 2019 that accused China of perpetrating a genocide against its Muslim Uyghur minority.<\/p>\n

Called the Federation of Canadian Chinese Associations in Chinese, the council sends Canadian youth on \u201croots-seeking\u201d trips organized by the United Front Work Department (UFWD), the CCP branch that spearheads Beijing\u2019s influence and interference efforts worldwide. Two former presidents of the group attended official events in China recently at the invitation of the UFWD. And an Australian report profiled the group as a case study of how Beijing spreads propaganda about the Uyghurs.<\/p>\n

Charles Burton, a Macdonald Laurier Institute expert on China, said Chow once invited him to take part in an event featuring a Hong Kong critic of Beijing. He said he was surprised she would associate with the Council.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s regrettable that she attended this meeting and received a gift from them,\u201d Burton said. \u201cThe whole thing is puzzling. I just don\u2019t understand. I am puzzled that she would be so involved with a group that seems to have such close ties to the Chinese consulate.\u201d<\/p>\n

A supporter of Chow\u2019s who asked not to be identified said he also wished she had not met with the Newcomers organization. But the person said such meetings were a \u201cnecessary evil\u201d for any politician who wished to reach out to Toronto\u2019s community of mainland-China immigrants.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would be cautious not to jump into any conclusion at this point of time,\u201d added Gloria Fung of the group Canada Hong Kong Link, a staunch critic of Beijing. \u201cProxies of CCP like to endorse any candidate with winnability. That does not necessarily imply the candidate they endorse has been compromised.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Council did not respond to a request for comment by deadline.<\/p>\n

Shirven Rezvany, a spokeswoman for Chow, said the group did not invite her to the meeting and did not endorse her. She arrived midway through and \u201cbrought greetings.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOlivia Chow has always stood up for the forces of freedom, human rights and democracy here in Canada, in China and beyond,\u201d said Rezvany. \u201cSince 1989, Olivia has stood side by side with pro-democracy advocates at the annual Tiananmen massacre commemoration in Toronto and incurred the wrath of some people that supported the Chinese government.\u201d<\/p>\n

The candidate does not agree with any organization that denies rights abuses or stifles democracy, she added.<\/p>\n

Recent polls have placed Chow in first place among several candidates vying to replace John Tory, who stepped down as mayor suddenly after admitting to having an affair with a member of his staff.<\/p>\n

The election is slated for June 26.<\/p>\n

In fact, she\u2019s not the only prominent Toronto-area politician to have rubbed shoulders with the Council. Current Liberal Trade Minister Mary Ng posted pictures of her celebrating the lunar New Year with the group in 2019, praising its efforts to promote \u201cdiversity and inclusion.\u201d<\/p>\n

More recently, interference and influence efforts by China or its representatives have come to dominate Canadian politics, after media reports quoted intelligence documents that accuse Beijing of meddling in federal and other elections.<\/p>\n

Among those reports, the Globe and Mail cited a Canadian Security Intelligence Service briefing that said Chinese diplomats tried to get sympathetic candidates elected in last year\u2019s Vancouver municipal vote, in part by using diaspora groups that represented Beijing\u2019s interests. Ken Sim, who won the mayor\u2019s race in a landslide, has denied that such interference played any part in his victory.<\/p>\n

According to a report on the Easyca.ca site, Chow spoke to the council April 30 about her campaign, before the group\u2019s executive chairman, Xing Jiyuan, presented her with a gift of a large Chinese porcelain vase and wished her electoral success.<\/p>\n

Despite its stated goal to bring together various ethnic groups, the council\u2019s charter stipulates that member associations must represent Chinese Canadians.<\/p>\n

At least twice in recent years, it has publicly echoed talking points of the PRC government. In one newspaper ad it condemned the mass Hong Kong protests of 2019 as the work of extremists colluding with foreign powers. In another, it dismissed the Commons resolution on Uyghur genocide as the product of \u201cignorance and prejudice\u201d against China.<\/p>\n

Its ties to Beijing reach further, though. Then head Zhu Jiang, a member of the People\u2019s Liberation Army before immigrating to Canada, was invited by the United Front to Beijing for 2019\u2019s lavish celebrations of the 70th anniversary of the founding of Communist China. Zhu wept while watching a military parade through Tiananmen Square, realizing how much he \u201cloved the motherland,\u201d he told the SuperLife news site.<\/p>\n

About the same time, a former leader of the council was acting as \u201cclass captain\u201d at an event in Beijing for \u201coverseas Chinese\u201d leaders, who were urged in part to defend \u201cthe core interests of the Chinese nation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The council was cited by Australian academics in a report last year on how the Chinese government tries to mold world opinion about the Uyghur issue by using front groups in other countries.<\/p>\n

Its statement on the genocide motion was repeated by China\u2019s state media \u201cto prove that members of the Chinese diaspora disagree with the Canadian parliament\u2019s decision,\u201d said the Australian Strategic Policy Institute report.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/nationalpost.com\/news\/politics\/toronto-mayor-olivia-chow-china<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Toronto mayoral candidate Olivia Chow meets with group aligned with China A Chow supporter says such meetings are a ‘necessary evil’ to re…
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