China accused of having secret police stations abroad to crack down on dissidents in other countries

China has opened more than 50 unofficial police “offices” globally, with most of them in Europe, to clamp down on its own dissidents without notifying the authorities or declaring their existence, according to reports.

Evidence has been uncovered by Dutch media outlet RTL News of “overseas service stations” in the Netherlands, in Rotterdam and Amsterdam, claiming to offer diplomatic services but instead taking action against opponents of China’s Communist regime.

The Dutch foreign ministry said the existence of these buildings set up unofficially is an “illegal” act because the government was never informed about them.

It follows an investigation by Spain-based NGO Safeguard Defenders that revealed at least 54 “overseas police service centres” have popped up across 21 countries on five continents.

Its report, Chinese Transnational Policing Gone Wild, said that most of these offices are in Europe, with nine in Spain and four in Italy. At least two have been found in London and one in Glasgow it said.

These unofficial enforcement bodies “also serve a more sinister goal as they contribute to resolutely cracking down on all kinds of illegal and criminal activities involving overseas Chinese”, according to the report.

According to the RTL News, the establishments help the Chinese-Dutch nationals renew their national driving licences and report changes in their civil status. But Safeguard Defenders said these stations actually carry out “persuasion operations”, looking to influence those suspected of speaking out against the Chinese regime to return to their homeland.

Persuasion techniques include denying suspects’ children the right to education in China as well as other actions against relatives and family members. China claims 230,000 nationals were persuaded to return to their country from 2021-22.

These police-style offices are also reportedly seeking contact with exiled Chinese critics in order to repress them even on Dutch soil, the report added, citing one such critic, Wang Jingyu, who was been hunted down by the Chinese police for three years in response to his criticism of the Xi Jinping administration on social media.

He said that he thought he was safe in a foreign land, but the officials from the “police station” follow him everywhere. Mr Wang has been given asylum in the European nation but he was contacted by the Chinese police station in Rotterdam.

Officials in the Netherlands have said they will probe the people behind these illegal offices and take action against them.

“These agencies are illegal. We will investigate exactly what they are doing here and then take appropriate action,” a foreign affairs ministry spokesperson told the publication.

Dutch intelligence experts have added that all foreign countries are permitted to carry out their operations only after getting permission from the Netherlands government.