Taiwanese who take out loans in China with a Chinese ID card but do not pay it back could be extradited to China for trial if they travel to countries that have mutual legal arrangements with Beijing, a Taiwan security official warned after the release of a YouTube video by Taiwanese rapper Chen Po-yuan (陳柏源) and YouTuber “Pa Chiung (八炯)” on China’s “united front” tactics.
In the video released last month, Lin Jincheng (林金城), head of the Taiwan Youth Entrepreneurship Park in Quanzhou in China’s Fujian Province which Chen visited, said Taiwanese could apply for a Chinese ID card, register a company in China and start a cross-border e-commerce business.
With a Chinese ID card, Taiwanese could purchase property and vehicles in China without a down payment and use them as collateral to apply for bank loans, Lin, who is wanted for fraud in Taiwan, said in the video.
Photo: Bloomberg file
The video also said that some young Taiwanese “entrepreneurs” "overborrow" from banks, then split the money with intermediaries and Chinese officials before transferring the rest back to Taiwan.
Taiwanese would not be able to get away even if they have no intention of going back to China, a security official, speaking anonymously, said.
“You might think a Chinese ID card is the way to a new life, but it could actually be the way to the end of the world,” the official said.
Chinese nationals are facing more obstacles than ever when it comes to immigration, employment or studying abroad, the official said.
The authorities said intermediaries are often people like Lin, who are gang members, unsuccessful Taiwanese businessmen or pro-unification extremists.
Luring Taiwanese to apply for a resident card, open a bank account and get a mobile phone number has become a shared goal for the Chinese government and crime syndicates, the official warned.
The Whampoa Club and the Straits Forum offered such a “service” not so long ago, the official said.
Some university professors, in hopes of getting a reward, would also organize “exchange” tours to China and encourage students to do so for the sake of convenience as they would have to scan a QR code whenever they pay for anything in China.
Intermediaries would say they could help with purchasing flats and cars, applying for bank loans and registering a company, and that there would be no problem with not repaying the loan as long as the applicant does not go back to China, the official said.
The Chinese government and the intermediaries would sell the applicants’ personal information or use it to start e-commerce businesses to sell illegal products, the official said.
The worst case would be the personal information being used for dummy accounts for scammers, the official said.
Apart from the Taiwan Youth Entrepreneurship Park, Chen also visited the Strait Herald news platform in Xiamen where he met with the paper’s assistant director Lin Jingdong (林靖東) who talked about strategies used to influence young Taiwanese as a part of China’s “united front” tactics.
The Strait Herald is conducting “united front” work against Taiwan, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Deputy Minister Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) told a press conference today.
The Strait Herald — owned by newspaper publisher Fujian Daily News, which is affiliated with the Fujian Provincial Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) — primarily focuses on issues related to Taiwan.
The Strait Herald and the Fujian Daily News will no longer be allowed to set up an office in Taiwan as it is not an ordinary news agency, Liang said, adding that Lin Jingdong was paid to interfere in Taiwan’s presidential election with forged poll results.
Additional reporting by Fang Wei-li and Sam Garcia
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