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The Chinese United Front Work Department is a branch of the Communist Party
The People's Republic of China has a “magic weapon”, according to its founding leader Mao Zedong and its current president Xi Jinping.
This is the United Front Work Department – and it is causing as much concern in the West as Beijing's growing military arsenal.
Yang Tengbo, a prominent businessman who has been linked to Prince Andrew, is the latest overseas Chinese citizen to be scrutinized – and sanctioned – for his links to the UFWD.
The existence of the department is far from a secret. A decades-old and well-documented branch of the Chinese Communist Party, it has already been mired in controversy. Investigators from the United States to Australia have cited the UFWD in multiple espionage cases, often accusing Beijing of using it for foreign interference.
Beijing has denied all allegations of spying, calling them ridiculous.
So, what is UFWD and what is it for?
“Controlling China’s message”
The United Front – which initially referred to a broad communist alliance – was once hailed by Mao as the key to the Communist Party's triumph in China's decades-long civil war.
After the end of the war in 1949 and the beginning of China's ruling party, United Front activities took a back seat to other priorities. But over the past decade under Xi, the United Front has enjoyed something of a renaissance.
Xi's version of the United Front is broadly consistent with its previous incarnations: “building the broadest possible coalition with all relevant social forces,” according to Mareike Ohlberg, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund.
At first glance, the UFWD is not in the shadows: it even has a website and reports on many of its activities there. But the extent of his work – and its reach – is less clear.
Although much of this work is done domestically, Dr. Ohlberg said, “a key target that has been defined for United Front work is overseas Chinese.”
Today, the UFWD seeks to influence public debates on sensitive issues ranging from Taiwan – which China claims as its territory – to the repression of ethnic minorities in Tibet and Xinjiang.
It also attempts to shape narratives about China in foreign media, target critics of the Chinese government abroad, and co-opt influential Chinese figures abroad.
“The work of the United Front may include espionage, but it goes beyond espionage,” Audrye Wong, assistant professor of politics at the University of Southern California, told the BBC.
“Beyond acquiring secret information from a foreign government, United Front activities focus on broader mobilization of overseas Chinese,” she said, adding that the China is “unique in the scale and scope” of such influence activities.
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Xi Jinping pleads for an assertive China abroad
China has always had ambitions to exert such influence, but its rise in recent decades has given Beijing the capacity to exert it.
Since Xi became president in 2012, he has been particularly proactive in crafting China's message to the world, encouraging a confrontational “wolf warrior” approach to diplomacy and urging his country's diaspora to “tell the story well.” the history of China.
The UFWD operates through various overseas Chinese community organizations, which have vigorously defended the Communist Party beyond its borders. They censored anti-CCP artwork and protested the activities of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. The UFWD has also been associated with threats against members of persecuted minorities abroad, such as Tibetans and Uyghurs.
But much of the UFWD's work overlaps with that of other party agencies, operating under what observers have described as “plausible deniability.”
It is this obscurity that creates so much suspicion and apprehension about the UFWD.
When Yang appealed his ban from the UK over espionage allegations, an immigration court ruled he had downplayed his links to the UFWD. British officials say he exploited his connections with influential British figures to interfere with the Chinese state.
Yang maintains, however, that he did nothing illegal and that the spying allegations are “totally false.”
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Mr Yang seen here with Prince Andrew
Cases like Yang's are becoming more and more common. In 2022, Chinese-British lawyer Christine Lee was accused by MI5 of acting through the UFWD to cultivate relationships with influential people in the United Kingdom. The following year, Liang Litang, an American citizen who ran a Chinese restaurant in Boston, was indicted for providing information about Chinese dissidents in the region to his contacts in the UFWD.
And in September, Linda Sun, a former aide in the New York governor's office, was accused of using her position to further the interests of the Chinese government – receiving perks including travel in exchange. According to Chinese state media, she met with a senior UFWD official in 2017, who told her to “be an ambassador of China-US friendship”.
It is not uncommon for prominent and successful Chinese to be associated with the party, whose approval they often need, particularly in the business world.
But where is the line between influence peddling and espionage?
“The line between influence and espionage is blurred” when it comes to Beijing’s operations, said Ho-fung Hung, a politics professor at Johns Hopkins University.
This ambiguity intensified after China passed a law in 2017 requiring Chinese nationals and companies to cooperate in intelligence investigations, including by sharing information with the Chinese government – a move that Dr. Hung said, ” effectively turns everyone into potential spies.”
The Ministry of State Security has released dramatic propaganda videos warning the public that foreign spies are everywhere and that they are “cunning and devious.”
Some students sent on special trips abroad have been asked by their universities to limit contact with foreigners and have been asked to report on their activities upon their return.
And yet, Xi is keen to promote China to the world. So he tasked a reliable branch of the party with projecting strength abroad.
And this becomes a challenge for Western powers: how to reconcile their trade relations with the world's second largest economy and their serious security concerns?
Fight with the long arm of Beijing
Real fears about China's influence abroad fuel more hawkish sentiments in the West, often leaving governments with a dilemma.
Some, like Australia, have tried to protect themselves with new foreign interference laws that criminalize individuals seen as interfering in domestic affairs. In 2020, the United States imposed visa restrictions on individuals considered active in UFWD activities.
An irritated Beijing warned that such laws – and the lawsuits they sparked – were hampering bilateral relations.
“The so-called allegations of Chinese espionage are completely absurd,” a Foreign Ministry spokesperson told reporters on Tuesday in response to a question about Yang. “The development of China-British relations serves the common interests of the two countries.”
Some experts believe that the long arm of China's United Front is indeed cause for concern.
“Western governments must now be less naive about the work of China's United Front and view it as a serious threat not only to national security but also to the safety and freedom of many ethnic Chinese citizens,” he said. Dr. Hung.
But, he adds, “governments must also be vigilant against anti-Chinese racism and work hard to build trust and cooperation with Chinese ethnic communities to jointly counter the threat.”
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The UFWD has been accused of putting pressure on foreign dissidents and critics of the Communist Party.
Last December, Di Sanh Duong, a Vietnam-born leader of Australia's Chinese community, was convicted of planning foreign interference for trying to approach an Australian minister. Prosecutors argued he was a “perfect target” for the UFWD because he ran for office in the 1990s and bragged about his ties to Chinese officials.
Duong's trial centered on what he meant when he said the minister's inclusion in a charity event would benefit “us Chinese”: whether he meant Australia's Chinese community or China's. continental?
Ultimately, Duong's conviction – and prison sentence – raised serious concerns that such broad anti-espionage laws and prosecutions could easily become weapons to target ethnic Chinese.
“It is important to remember that not everyone who is of Chinese descent is a supporter of the Chinese Communist Party. And not everyone who is involved in these diaspora organizations has a fervent loyalty to China.” , explains Dr. Wong.
“Overly aggressive policies based on racial profiling will only legitimize the Chinese government's propaganda that ethnic Chinese are not welcome and will ultimately push diaspora communities further into the arms of Beijing.”
