• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
  • HOME
  • ABOUT CHINA
    • NEWS
    • TESTIMONIES
    • OP-EDS
    • FEATURED
    • GLOSSARY
    • CHINA PERSECUTION MAP
  • FROM THE WORLD
    • NEWS
    • OP-EDS
    • FEATURED
    • TESTIMONIES
  • INTERVIEWS
  • DOCUMENTS AND TRANSLATIONS
    • DOCUMENTS
    • THE TAI JI MEN CASE
    • TRANSLATIONS
  • EVENTS
  • ABOUT
  • EDITORIAL BOARD
  • TOPICS

Bitter Winter

A magazine on religious liberty and human rights

three friends of winter
Home / China / Testimonies China

Chinese Authorities Pursue Families of Believers Who Fled Abroad

07/29/2018Lin Yijiang |

china
The family of a believer in Almighty God has been harassed to coerce him into coming back to China after he had left because of his faith.

Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities persecute not only believers who live in the country, but they also target those who have fled abroad, particularly members of The Church of Almighty God, a Chinese Christian new religious movement. Internal Party documents reveal orders to all levels of government to “pursue those who have fled,” “to gain a comprehensive understanding of the number of believers in The Church of Almighty God,” and ”to carry out in-depth investigations of their backbones outside of the country.” Family members of those who have fled are frequently harassed and coerced into persuading them to return to China.

In 2014, Chen Qiyuan (pseudonym), a member of The Church of Almighty God, was questioned by the principal of his college for sharing the gospel with his classmates. The principal warned him to give up his faith and said that if authorities found out about a student believing in God and preaching the gospel, they would investigate the campus, bringing a great deal of trouble to the school. He warned Chen Qiyuan that if he continued with his faith, he would be forced to quit his studies, and the school would clear all of his records to prevent any government scrutiny. Chen Qiyuan refused to give up his faith and was forced to drop out of school, taking up manual labor jobs while preaching the gospel. The CCP government began persecuting him, so he fled overseas in 2015.

An informed source revealed that six months after Chen Qiyuan left China, two local government officials and four police officers repeatedly visited the home of his parents, to inquire into his whereabouts. They said they had received orders from their superiors to perform a special investigation into Chen Qiyuan’s reasons for leaving the country. They also asked if he had been in contact with family members since going abroad and demanded that his parents persuade him to come back to China; otherwise they would find a way to “bring him back.”

The police made three more visits to the home of Chen Qiyuan’s parents, in March and July 2017, and in April 2018. After registering the personal information of all the family members, they took photos inside and outside the house and pressured the parents to make Chen Qiyuan come back home. They implied knowing about Chen Qiyuan’s belief in Almighty God; and if he were not willing to return to China of his own accord, they would take measures to get him arrested. “We have ways of dealing with this,” they said, threatening to apprehend the whole family and imprison them, making sure that their grandchildren would not be able to go to school or get residence permits.

Reported by Lin Yijiang

Tagged With: Chinese Communist Party, The Church of Almighty God

Lin Yijiang profile picture
Lin Yijiang

Uses a pseudonym for security reasons.

Related articles

  • No Sex Please, We’re Chinese: Crackdown on the Oldest Student Sexology Association in China

    No Sex Please, We’re Chinese: Crackdown on the Oldest Student Sexology Association in China

  • “Xi Jinping 2.0”: A Cold, Brutal, Inexorable Power Machine

    “Xi Jinping 2.0”: A Cold, Brutal, Inexorable Power Machine

  • No Room for Denial: Timothy Grose Documents Atrocities in Xinjiang from CCP’s Own Sources

    No Room for Denial: Timothy Grose Documents Atrocities in Xinjiang from CCP’s Own Sources

  • “Butcher of Tibetans” Zhao Erfeng Celebrated by the CCP

    “Butcher of Tibetans” Zhao Erfeng Celebrated by the CCP

Keep Reading

  • Stricter Rules on Private Tutoring Protect Ideology Rather than Parents
    Stricter Rules on Private Tutoring Protect Ideology Rather than Parents

    There were real concerns about the fees and role of tutoring firms. But as usual the CCP took the opportunity to impose more ideological control.

  • Tibet: Who Killed the Friend of Black-Necked Cranes?
    Tibet: Who Killed the Friend of Black-Necked Cranes?

    Luo Huaibin, a famous scholar who protested the destruction of Tibetan forests and wetlands, was assassinated in 2020. The assassins are still at large.

  • The 20th Congress of the CCP: Did Anything Happen?
    The 20th Congress of the CCP: Did Anything Happen?

    What was really new was not what most media reported. Xi mentioned “security” and “Marxism” more often than economy, and promised to make the rich less rich.

  • Zero COVID: Chinese Propaganda Tries to Rewrite History
    Zero COVID: Chinese Propaganda Tries to Rewrite History

    The Party claims it had decided to abandon the policy on November 10, before the Urumqi Fire and the protests. This is false.

Primary Sidebar

Support Bitter Winter

Learn More

Follow us

Newsletter

Most Read

  • France Joins China and Russia by Introducing Special Police Techniques Against “Cults” by Massimo Introvigne
  • “Socialist Spiritual Civilization”: The Great Comeback of an Old CCP Concept by Hu Zimo
  • The Fate of Tibet After the Inevitable: A Tibetan Opinion by Ugyen Gyalpo
  • Ngaba Prefecture, Sichuan: Massive Re-Education to Prevent Tibetan Self-Immolations by Lopsang Gurung
  • Wang Hai: Miao Christian Pastor Still Harassed and Investigated by Mo Yuan
  • L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology, and the Visual Arts. 7. The Scientologist as Artist by Massimo Introvigne
  • Mark Fino: No Asylum in Japan for Evangelist Threatened in Bangladesh by Tom Eskildsen

CHINA PERSECUTION MAP -SEARCH NEWS BY REGION

clickable geographical map of china, with regions

Footer

EDITORIAL BOARD

Editor-in-Chief

MASSIMO INTROVIGNE

Director-in-Charge

MARCO RESPINTI

ADDRESS

CESNUR

Via Confienza 19,

10121 Turin, Italy,

Phone: 39-011-541950

E-MAIL

We welcome submission of unpublished contributions, news, and photographs. Each submission implies the authorization for us to edit and publish texts and photographs. We reserve the right to decide which submissions are suitable for publication. Please, write to INFO@BITTERWINTER.ORG Thank you.

Newsletter

LINKS

orlir-logo hrwf-logo cesnur-logo

Copyright © 2023 · Bitter Winter · PRIVACY POLICY· COOKIE POLICY