China

Chinese Activist Reportedly Fled to SKorea on Jet Ski

AUG 22 2023·Updated AUG 25 2023

Story

Image credit: Unsplash

The Facts

Kwon Pyong, a Chinese rights activist and prominent critic of President Xi Jinping, has allegedly fled his homeland to South Korea — crossing the choppy waters of the Yellow Sea on a jet ski from Shandong province.
BBC News
This comes as the Incheon station of the South Korea Coast Guard reported Sunday that a man was detained last Wednesday.
Guardian
South Korean authorities found no sign that the man was a spy, adding that he called for rescue after his jet ski got stuck in tidal flats near the western port city of Incheon.
CNA
Though the coastguard did not identify the man, South Korea-based campaigner Lee Dae-seon of the nongovernmental organization Dialogue China told AFP Tuesday that the escapee is Kwon Pyong. The Chinese embassy in Seoul declined to comment.
France 24
Lee added that Kwon was now mulling whether to apply for refugee status in South Korea, which only grants a handful of requests each year, or to choose a third country, as he has been politically persecuted by Chinese authorities since 2016.
France 24
The 35-year-old Chinese national spent time in prison in his homeland for publicly criticizing Xi, and he is likely to have been subject to an exit ban preventing him from leaving the country legally to claim asylum.
BBC News

Sources Split

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The Spin

Anti-China narrative

It's no coincidence that the number of Chinese asylum-seekers has soared since Xi took office in 2012, even if that means undertaking a perilous journey. Beijing has tightened its control across the PRC regarding civil liberties, suppressing ethnic minorities, and not tolerating even the slightest opposition. Kwon Pyong is just the latest example of this appalling trend.

The Economist

Pro-China narrative

It's very typical for the West and its allies to distort the truth to smear China, consistently identifying criminals fleeing the country as mere political dissidents. Take the case of Kwon Pyong — the so-called activist who ended up in jail for violating Chinese law has once again revealed his criminal nature by unlawfully entering South Korea.

Global Times