US charges Chinese executive for sabotaging video conferences on Tiananmen massacre
Dec 19, 2020
Washington [US], December 19 : Federal court has charged Chinese executive Xinjiang Jin, also known as "Julien Jin" and an employee of a US-based telecommunications company, for his involvement in a conspiracy to disrupt meetings in May and June this year held to commemorate the June 4, 1989, Tiananmen Square massacre.
According to an official statement by the US Department of Justice, if the charges against Jin are proven then he will face a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
The complaint has stated that Jin served as the US' telecommunications company's primary liaison with the People's Republic of China (PRC) law enforcement and intelligence services and "regularly responded to requests from the PRC government for information and to terminate video meetings" hosted by the company's video communications platform.
"Part of Jin's duties included providing information to the PRC government about Company-1's (US company) users and meetings, and in some cases, he provided information - such as Internet Protocol addresses, names, and email addresses - of users located outside of the PRC. Jin was also responsible for proactively monitoring Company-1's video communications platform for what the PRC government considers to be "illegal" meetings to discuss political and religious subjects unacceptable to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the PRC government," read the complaint.
It further said that since January 2019, Jin was using his company's systems to censor the political and religious speech of individuals located in the US and around the world at the direction and under the control of officials of the PRC government.
He had terminated at least four video meetings hosted on his company's networks commemorating the 31st anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, most of which were organized and attended by US-based participants, such as dissidents who had participated in and survived the 1989 protests. Some of the participants who were unable to attend these meetings included the company's customers in Queens and Long Island, New York.
"The charges announced today make clear that employees working in the PRC for US technology companies make those companies--and their users--vulnerable to the malign influence of the PRC government," said Seth D. DuCharme, Acting United States Attorney.
