A coalition of hundreds of human rights activists and other organizations recently sent an open letter to U.S. Attorney General William Barr asking the U.S. Department of Justice to designate the Chinese Communist Party a "transnational criminal organization," saying that their “lethality and criminal sophistication demonstrates that this lawless CCP poses a clear and present danger to the health, security, and prosperity of America.”
The authors cite concerns about crimes that include broad intellectual property theft, human trafficking and the deliberate spread of the deadly coronavirus. The move comes as tensions between the U.S. and China continue to rise, with the U.S. closing the Chinese consulate in Houston and China closing the U.S. consulate in Chengdu in recent weeks.
In making their case, they cited an executive order signed by President Trump in February 2017 that states the executive branch’s policy is to “strengthen enforcement of Federal law in order to thwart transnational criminal organizations and subsidiary organizations, including criminal gangs, cartels, racketeering organizations, and other groups engaged in illicit activities that present a threat to public safety and national security.”
It’s easy to see how the CCP would qualify, given the executive order specifies activities like cybercrime, corruption, financial crimes, intellectual property theft, and fraud in its list of activities that transnational criminal organizations carry out.
In their letter, they outline how the deadly synthetic drug Fentanyl, which is manufactured and distributed by the Chinese, has been killing American citizens in droves, with more than 31,000 Americans overdosing on such drugs in 2018 alone.
Moreover, their handling of coronavirus is also criminal, and its staggering effects on the economy and public health of Americans and the rest of the world are undeniable. As we know, the CCP failed to warn the world about the virus and took steps to cover up its transmission and deadliness. So far, more than 140,000 people in the U.S. have died from the virus, and that number continues to climb at a significant rate.
The letter was drafted by famed human rights lawyer Liz Yore with input from Hong Kong businessman and activist Elmer Yuen, the Committee on the Present Danger: China, and the non-profit Save the Persecuted Christians. Yuen has been actively seeking a legal basis to disarm the CCP and hopefully dissolve it so its many heinous acts can come to an end.
Yore cited recent speeches by the administration that outline the CCP’s crimes against humanity and illegal behavior in recent times. For example, the CCP obtained personal details on 383 million Marriott guests through a 2019 hack, along with that of 145 million Americans in the 2017 Equifax hack.
The letter also pointed out that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a July 8 press conference that the CCP was responsible for spreading coronavirus. He also called out the CCP for holding Muslim Uyghurs in Xinjiang camps, where they are subjected to forced sterilizations and abortions, among other horrors. The China Tribunal found that they were also guilty of industrial-scale organ harvesting.
What would the TCO designation accomplish?
Yuen said that such a designation would give the CCP’s crimes a collective name and draw greater attention to the problems. If other countries follow suit, it could have an even bigger impact.
Moreover, the TCO designation would lead to a coordinated effort by country-wide law enforcement and federal agencies. It would trigger economic sanctions against the companies and banks that do business with the CCP and impose other types of sanctions and criminal penalties that could help curb their behavior.
Yore said that while the Trump administration has already made some progress in educating the public on the CCP’s ways, she thinks a criminal label would help wake the public up to what is really going on.
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