Australian Broadcasting Corporation
"Lateline" Television Program Transcript
"Chinese Defector Details Spy Claims"
Broadcast: June 20, 2005

Reporter: Tony Jones

TONY JONES: Back now to our interview with the would-be Chinese defector, the diplomat Chen Yonglin. Given what he's saying about the activities of a Chinese network of agents and informers in this country, there's been a good deal of pressure on the Government to make sure that Mr. Chen is protected against any action against him. We now understand he's been given the number of a policeman to call if he's threatened in any way, but he still says he's living in fear of being sent back to imprisonment or death, while the Immigration Department slowly processes his asylum claim. Tonight Mr. Chen fleshes out in more detail his allegations about how the network operates and who are its key targets. I spoke to him in Sydney earlier today.

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TONY JONES: Can you confirm the existence of the 6-10 Office which the defecting policeman, Mr. Hao, tells us that he worked for in China. Can you confirm, to your knowledge, the 6-10 Office exists in China?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes, 6-10 Office was established in 1999 on June 10. That was established to control the Falun Gong organization and, in my view, to persecute Falun Gong practitioners.

TONY JONES: To persecute them?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes.

TONY JONES: Is it common knowledge among Chinese officials, diplomats, consular offices and so on that the 6-10 Office exists because the Chinese Government says it doesn't exist?

CHEN YONGLIN: It exists. Every diplomat working in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs knows that [the 6-10 Office] existed, yes, 6-10.

TONY JONES: So how does the 6-10 Office gather information about individual Chinese people in Australia? Do you have any idea?

CHEN YONGLIN: The 6-10 - I believe that's because not only the consulate engaged in collecting information about Falun Gong activities. There are some other departments, I believe.

TONY JONES: What sort of departments are they?

CHEN YONGLIN: Including, I believe, some security people.

TONY JONES: So there are security people operating inside the embassy or external people?

CHEN YONGLIN: Outside the embassy.

TONY JONES: So they're infiltrated into Australian society, but they're members of the security operation, is that right? Or security apparatus?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes, I'm not clear about how they do operate in Australia.

TONY JONES: But these are the people that you describe as spies and agents?

CHEN YONGLIN: That's the number I got from a document - the number of 1,000 - the secret agent and informant. Informants, yes.

TONY JONES: So you actually read a document which...

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes.

TONY JONES: ..when you were in the consulate...

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes.

TONY JONES: ..which sets out how many informants and agents there are in the country.

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes.

TONY JONES: Can I ask you to look at a document that we've been given. It is one of the documents that the defecting Chinese policeman, Mr. Hao, brought with him to Australia. These were taken out of his computer, his police computer. Could you have a look at that and see whether you think that is a real document?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yeah, this document sounds like a real one, except no stamp. And I believe that - yeah, it sounds like a real one.

TONY JONES: Yeah. For the benefit of the audience, I should say I did show you this document earlier, but it names individuals and some of the other documents that we've seen also name individuals who have been targeted for surveillance in this country, including, in this case, a young Chinese student named Yan Yang. Now, it says she is a Falun Gong member who has been organizing their activities inside NSW University, and she was quite shocked when she saw this document. Does it shock you that someone has followed her activities so closely in this country that it appears in a report in a police computer?

CHEN YONGLIN: It seems quite normal that some students and maybe Chinese nationals are maybe not - they have some close relation with the consulate or embassy. They may talk about what Falun Gong are carrying on, the activity.

TONY JONES: You mean that some other students may be telling the embassy or the consulate what their fellow students are doing, is that what you mean?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yes, that's possible.

TONY JONES: Let me ask you this from your knowledge of the 6-10 Office and its persecution of Falun Gong: If your name appeared in a document like this and you were a student in Australia, what would happen to you when you went back to China?

CHEN YONGLIN: Oh, you definitely would be monitored and under surveillance of the public security officers and will be strictly confined in the movement in China.

TONY JONES: Now, we understand that 250,000 Chinese citizens are actually held in forced labor or education through labor camps, as they are euphemistically called. That is the government's own figure, actually. Do you know - I mean, were you aware, as a Chinese official, of these labor camps and their use for suppressing dissidents?

CHEN YONGLIN: It's known to the world that a lot of pro-democracy activities were put in jail in China and also I know that I was told by senior official of 6-10 Office that there are about 60,000 practitioners in China and half of them are in prison and labor camps.

TONY JONES: You were told that yourself?

CHEN YONGLIN: I was told.

TONY JONES: By a...

CHEN YONGLIN: By a senior official of 6-10 Office.

TONY JONES: Was that when you were in...

CHEN YONGLIN: I was working in the Chinese consulate and this senior official came to inspect our job about Falun Gong.

TONY JONES: They actually sent a senior member of 6-10 to make sure that you were doing a good job...

CHEN YONGLIN: Yep.

TONY JONES: ..monitoring Falun Gong's activities, is that right?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yeah, of course he said that the consulate came to know about implementing the government policy of the policy strategy, like fight eyeball to eyeball, should be more aggressive.

TONY JONES: So when was this, by the way?

CHEN YONGLIN: That was at the end of year 2003.

TONY JONES: So let me get this straight: You were told by a senior official of the 6-10 Office in Sydney that you should go eyeball to eyeball with Falun Gong members and be more aggressive in the way you approached your surveillance of them, is that right?

CHEN YONGLIN: Right.

TONY JONES: Did you actually do that?

CHEN YONGLIN: No. That's why they are quite displeased.

TONY JONES: But that message would have gone to other members of the consulate, to other diplomats also in the embassy in Canberra as well. Do you know that it did?

CHEN YONGLIN: Yeah, yeah.

TONY JONES: So the message came from China: We need a crackdown in Australia of the Falun Gong members.

CHEN YONGLIN: Their idea is that it is overseas missions to blame that caused the problem in China. If there is no disturbance from overseas in China, the 6-10 Office can solve every problem in China, should finish the Falun Gong issue very quickly.

TONY JONES: So, in fact, what they're saying is the big problem for China comes from countries like Australia and Canada and the United States, where there are overseas Chinese working for Falun Gong?

CHEN YONGLIN: Overseas - the Falun Gong practitioners put pressure to the Government, the Chinese Government, and launch too many activities so that - and try to influence, mobilize their force, their influence in China.

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http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2005/s1396471.htm