/cloudfront-ap-northeast-1.images.arcpublishing.com/appledaily/WTVOBYNK6H3GKMG4EHU54K55LE.jpg)
Mainland Chinese students living overseas who post criticisms of President Xi Jinping and the government say their families back home are being harassed and intimidated by police in an effort to shut them up.
Melbourne-based student Wuyuan Dong, who goes by the name Zoo, told Voice of America that police had called her father in for questioning over a Twitter account she had registered late last year.
The account is named Xi Jinping@FakeNewsOfChina and has a banner with the Chinese characters for “Mr Cesspit” over a digitally altered headshot of Xi. It now has almost 7,000 followers, and contains photos and messages that ridicule China’s leader.
Police demanded that Zoo’s father, a Communist Party scholar and lecturer in Xi Jinping thought, make a video call to his daughter and ask her to hand over the Twitter account’s password.
During the call, Zoo’s father warned his daughter “not to be used by other people” and told her that “Xi Jinping is a very good leader.”
Zoo’s father was taken away by police again after his daughter spoke during an online conference held by dissident Zhao Feng on May 31 to commemorate the June 4 Tiananmen Square massacre.
Police again pressed Zoo to hand over the Twitter login, and also demanded she return to China and give herself up to police.
Zoo said she won’t give in to the demands, adding that she must protect her Twitter followers.
“I won’t compromise on this. If they want to try to force me to back down, I will fight to the end,” she said.
In another case, U.S.-based student Luo Yupeng — not his real name — was woken up by five phone calls around 4 a.m. one day. At first he thought these were scam calls and ignored them.
A few days later, Chinese police forced their way into his mother’s home and took her away for questioning.
Police later told Luo that what landed him in trouble was a comment he had left under U.S. President Donald Trump’s tweet about the origin of COVID-19. Luo’s comment was: “Yes, it is a Chinese virus.”
With the threat of harassment hanging over his mother, Luo deleted all of his tweets as ordered to by police. His mother was made to sign a letter promising that she would closely monitor her son’s behavior.
“There’s nothing I can do,” he said. “My mother is in their hands.”
Click here for Chinese version.
---------------------------------
Apple Daily’s all-new English Edition is now available on the mobile app
To know more: https://bit.ly/2yMMfQE
Apple Daily mobile app latest version DOWNLOAD NOW
