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The Chinese Foreign Ministry on Thursday identified one of the four individuals sent back to China in a prisoner swap that freed three Americans imprisoned in the country as a “fugitive” of the Chinese Communist Party, warning that “no one can escape” communist “justice.”

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning claimed three other repatriated Chinese nationals were “wrongfully detained” in America. The Chinese Communist Party has not identified any of the individuals the administration of outgoing President Joe Biden sent back to China in exchange for the American hostages.

The Biden administration announced on Thursday that three Americans – Mark Swidan, Kai Li and John Leung – were on their way home from China as part of negotiations with the communist regime. The three Americans arrived in Texas late Wednesday local time.

Swidan was arrested in China in 2012, accused of allegedly engaging in drug crime. The draconian Chinese legal system sentenced him to death in April 2023, over a decade after his initial detention. Swidan was in the country on a business trip and arrested after Chinese police claimed to find drugs on some of his associates, but reportedly never shared evidence of any drugs on Swidan himself. He was nonetheless accused of being a methamphetamine trafficker.

Kai Li was arrested upon landing in Shanghai in 2016 for an event to mark the anniversary of his mother’s death, accused of being a spy and ultimately sentenced to ten years in prison. American authorities have denied any association with Li as a spy and accused the Chinese government of torturing him and denying him basic due process, such as access to a lawyer.

John Leung also faced “espionage” charges and was sentenced to life in prison in 2023. Prior to his arrest, Leung reportedly organized pro-regime events in the United States and even received public praise from Chinese state propaganda for leading “patriotic” communists abroad.

In apparent recognition of the prisoner swap, the Biden administration awarded the genocidal Chinese regime with a downgrade in State Department travel warnings. The State Department now asks Americans to “exercise increased caution” while in China, rather than to “reconsider travel” there entirely. The State Department claimed after the swap that, as a result, no Americans are currently “wrongfully imprisoned” there. Speaking to the Washington outlet Politico, however, former political prisoner Peter Humphrey said that “close to 300 American prisoners in China” remain, declaring the change in travel warning “grossly irresponsible.”

The identities of the individuals the Americans were traded for remains unknown. Mao offered simply a condemnation of the U.S. justice system for imprisoning three of them.

“Through the unremitting efforts of the Chinese government, three Chinese citizens wrongfully detained by the US have returned safely to China. It once again shows that never ever will China give up on its citizens,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told reporters on Thursday.

“The motherland will always have their back. Let me stress that China remains firmly opposed to the US’s politically driven suppression and persecution of Chinese nationals,” she continued, “and will continue taking all measures necessary to defend the legitimate and lawful rights and interests of Chinese nationals.”

Mao added the detail that one of the individuals sent back to China was not “wrongfully detained,” but “a fugitive who fled to the US many years ago and has now been repatriated to China.” The spokeswoman used the opportunity to threaten enemies of the communist state abroad.

“No one can escape justice, and no place on earth can be a safe haven forever for crime. The Chinese government will continue its work to bring back fugitives and recover their illegal proceeds, and will not rest until they are all brought to justice,” she asserted.

Mao also celebrated the travel warning downgrade, stating that Chinese officials “oppose any move that can have a chilling effect.”

The identity of the alleged Chinese fugitive and which laws the regime claims they violated may be cause for alarm, as China notoriously persecutes anti-communists all around the world to silence their beliefs. The human rights organization Freedom House describes China as running “the most sophisticated, global, and comprehensive campaign of transnational repression in the world,” persecuting “multiple ethnic and religious minorities, political dissidents, human rights activists, journalists, and former insiders” alike. The tactics China uses to silence and persecute individuals it considers enemies of communism range from “direct attacks like renditions, to co-opting other countries to detain and render exiles, to mobility controls, to threats from a distance.”

“All told, these tactics affect millions of Chinese and minority populations from China in at least 36 host countries across every inhabited continent,” the group explains in its transnational repression report.

Among the most alarming ways that China has persecuted dissidents abroad is the establishment of illegal police stations throughout the free world. The human rights group Safeguard Defenders revealed in a bombshell September 2o22 report that China was operating dozens of such secret police stations in cities such as New York, Toronto, Dublin, Budapest, and Tokyo.

In April 2023, prosecutors in New York announced a sprawling investigation into two suspects accused of “repeatedly and flagrantly violat[ing] our nation’s sovereignty by opening and operating a police station in the middle of New York City.”

The Chinese government has repeatedly and enthusiastically denied the evidence that it persecutes dissidents abroad through the establishment of illegal police stations, claiming the facilities in question are convenience posts to help Chinese nationals renew their drivers’ licenses and other basic government services.

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