Thank you, Chair.
In general, for many years our national security apparatus has identified foreign interference efforts by the top perpetrator countries as being Russia, Iran and the PRC.
During my term as an MP, I actively supported and worked with Canadians in the Persian community to tackle foreign interference and coercive transnational repression here. However, I shall share my views and experience, using the Chinese Communist Party example as a window into how it is implemented here in our country.
The aim of the CCP regime's shadow operation is to exploit what it sees as weakness to advance its interests and influence our decision-making process, domestically as well as internationally. Because of language barriers and cultural challenges, we have diaspora communities that feel most comfortable with, and even exclusively consume, ethnic media content.
Popular CCP-sanctioned monolithic technologies, such as WeChat, also provide a convenient platform to either suppress dissension or promote and spread disinformation. That presents a golden opportunity for the CCP.
As filed by Alliance Canada Hong Kong in a 2021 submission and a March 2023 Radio-Canada investigative report, the Communist regime has successfully monopolized Chinese ethnic media, either through complete takeover or being caught up via the carrot-and-stick approach with business interests. With the successful execution of this strategy, the CCP has effectively controlled the diaspora communities' hearts and minds.
In the long run, it perpetrates a false narrative of a complete equivalence of the Chinese Communist Party and China, the state, and the Chinese race. Therefore, criticizing the CCP will quickly escalate into anti-Chinese racism. Globally the CCP is also consistently spreading a lie, weaponizing nationalism, that the western world led by the U.S. is selfishly suppressing a rising China, that the CCP's miraculous achievements are the reason all ethnic Chinese can finally lift their heads high, that there remains much colonial imperialistic anti-Asian racism in these hypocritical western democracies, and that only the CCP's interests align with the welfare and betterment of ethnic Chinese worldwide.
This explains why the recent CSIS whistle-blower reports by reputable media such as The Globe and Mail, Global News and the CBC have been portrayed by some pro-CCP mouthpiece media and commentators as Canada's deliberate racist acts under the U.S. command to undermine a rising China.
The lack of reliable and reputable fact-checking resources in their language further perpetrates the miscommunication. It sends a deep distrust and resentment of Canadian society in general, and pits the we versus they, divide-and-conquer struggle among us. With that long-term foundation laid, and continuing to be laid as we speak, the regime can activate its political influence by spreading seemingly authoritative commentary or news stories at the right time.
For example, in 2021 a complete mischaracterization of my proposed establishment of a foreign influence registry was circulated in WeChat and WhatsApp groups, saying that it was anti-Chinese or a pretext for a future Chinese internment effort, or that if elected prime minister, the anti-Chinese Erin O'Toole, then Conservative leader, would ban WeChat, jeopardizing the only familial or business link they so rely on. Their goal is twofold: to install decision-makers they have access to or control of and to remove those who stand against their efforts— vocal detractors, if you will.
To be clear, being a beneficiary of these efforts does not necessarily imply collusion. The CCP not only honours the age-old philosophy that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but also practises equal opportunity among races, with corruption and collusion with anybody willing to submit, within or outside of the Chinese community.
In 2018, Australian Senator Sam Dastyari resigned in a Chinese government-linked scandal. This serves as a good reminder. Indeed, to link any effort against foreign interference with anti-Asian racism not only plays into the CCP playbook; it is a racist comment on its own, since it implies that the CCP will corrupt only ethnic Chinese, ignoring all the cries and demands for action from the very same community, some of whom have taken the great effort of speaking in front of a House committee, such as yours.
In conclusion, foreign interference and transnational repression are complex geopolitical issues. Unfortunately, in my humble opinion, Canada has run out of time in dithering and procrastinating. This is the moment not for more talk and virtue signalling, but for legislative actions that aim to protect Canada, your home and home to many cultural communities.
Thank you.