China is turning to the U.S. courts system in an attempt to pressure fugitives to return home and face corruption charges, part of President Xi Jinping’s strong-arm tactics to check political behavior and crackdown on systemic corruption, according to lawyers, current government officials, court documents and public statements from the Chinese government, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Of 23 people on the Communist Party’s anti-corruption agency list of fugitive officials and executives accused of corruption, at least six face or have faced lawsuits in U.S. courts by plaintiffs from China or with ties to state-owned companies.
“They’re going after these people not because of a business dispute in China. They’re going after these people because they violated Chinese criminal law,” Dan Harris, a lawyer specializing in matters related to doing business in China, told the Journal. “They’re not only doing an end-run around the State Department and the DOJ. They’re really doing an end-run around U.S. law.”
Xi launched a “war on corruption” after taking power more than eight years ago.
More than 1,000 Chinese fugitives who fled abroad were returned to the country last year and more than $519 million in ill-gotten gains was recovered, the ruling Communist Party said in 2019.
The party's anti-corruption watchdog said among the 1,335 returned were 307 party members or government employees, including five on a list of 100 most-wanted Chinese corruption suspects handed over to Interpol.
China says its campaign to return white-collar criminals and recover assets has captured more than 5,000 fugitives in all.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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