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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday that he had imposed visa restrictions on Chinese officials and others who have used or threatened to use violence, the disclosure of private information or other coercive tactics to intimidate critics.
Pompeo did not name those sanctioned in a written statement accusing the Labor Department of the United Front of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) of coercing and intimidating “those who oppose Beijing’s policies.”
“The United Front frequently intimidates members of academia, business, civil society groups, and Chinese diaspora communities, including members of ethnic and religious minorities, who denounce the horrific human rights abuses they they take place in Xinjiang, Tibet and other parts of China. ” he said, saying their coercive tactics include disclosing personal details of their targets, a practice known as “doxing.”
Pompeo said the visa restrictions would apply to those “who have engaged in the use or threat of physical violence, theft and disclosure of private information, espionage, sabotage, or malicious interference in domestic political affairs, academic freedom, personal privacy or activity. business.. “
It accused China of seeking to “co-opt and coerce” people in the United States and elsewhere to support its “authoritarian narratives and political preferences” and called on Beijing “to end the use of coercion and intimidation tactics to stifle the freedom of expression. “
(Report by Susan Heavey and Arshad Mohammed; written by Arshad Mohammed; edited by Chris Reese and Chizu Nomiyama)
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