The US might deport to China the ex-wife of a fugitive Chinese official indicted on money laundering and immigration fraud charges, a US prosecutor on Wednesday said.
The US Department of Justice on Tuesday indicted Qiao Jianjun (喬建軍), the former director of a government grain storage facility in central China, and his ex-wife, Zhao Shilan (趙世蘭), accusing them of funneling stolen money into the US and fraudulently obtaining US visas.
Zhao was arrested in the US state of Washington and held without bail while Qiao remains at large.
Los Angeles Assistant US Attorney Ronald Cheng (程樂其) said one option was for Zhao to be deported for violating immigration law by falsely claiming to be married to Qiao and lying about the source of their money to obtain a US visa.
Zhao could face deportation if convicted of the immigration charges to get around the lack of an extradition treaty between the US and China, the prosecutor said.
“It is certainly a possible consequence that she could be removed back to China,” Cheng said in an interview.
US officials said they do not know Qiao’s whereabouts, but if caught, he might also face deportation.
“We look forward to our side of the case coming forward as events progress,” Zhao’s attorney, Kirk Davis, said.
Zhao’s first court appearance is today.
The indictment, unsealed in Los Angeles, states the couple bought a home in the Seattle suburb of Newcastle with approximately US$500,000 of laundered money gleaned from fraudulent transactions related to a huge grain storehouse in Henan Province, where Qiao served as director from 1998 to 2011.
US law enforcement agents traveled to China to interview witnesses and gather intelligence before indicting the couple, in a case demonstrating growing cooperation between the US and China over the hunting down of corrupt Chinese fugitives in the US.
In Beijing, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Hong Lei (洪磊) yesterday said that the Qiao case was one of the five most important cases the two countries had agreed to work on together.
“There are no safe harbors in the world for corrupt elements like Qiao Jianjun,” Hong told reporters.
The Chinese government has launched a campaign, dubbed Operation Fox Hunt, to hunt down officials and businessmen who have absconded, often taking their ill-gotten gains with them, part of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) battle against deep-seated graft.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS