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article noted that this practice of offering Party commissions to overseas Chinese to work overseas On united front tasks was not new. The president of the United Fujianese American Association (= )#83#24\M) told reporters: “I have received quite a few letters of appointment on previous occasions, but none for which I have felt such deep significance as the one today. It’s a heavy responsibility.”"*
Peaceful Reunification Councils
A key goal of PRC overseas activities is to convince, and sometimes pressure, Chinese in the United States to accept that the PRC government in Beijing is the sole representative of China and Chinese, and that the Republic of China on Taiwan is an illegitimate government. To this end, in 1988, the Party’s United Front Work Department founded the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification, and the Washington, DC, Association to Promote China Unification was folded into the council. The DC chapter’s assignment was to organize concerts, demonstrations, and other gatherings
to support the PRC. Other chapters soon opened, so that by 2018, the council had established thirty-three in the United States and more than two hundred branches overseas. In America, these organizations are generally registered as domestic nonprofit community organizations, even though their leadership in Beijing includes senior members of the Chinese Communist Party. Indeed, an article in the People’s Daily, the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party, spoke in glowing terms about how useful the Peaceful Reunification Councils were in furthering China’s goals of taking over Taiwan, noting that while chapters of the Peaceful Reunification Council complied with US law by registering as nonprofits, they were established to support Chinese government policies and coordinate activities with PRC consulates in the United States.'° “Over the years, the China Peaceful Reunification Council in Northern California has actively cooperated with the local Chinese consulate to work against ‘Taiwan independence’ and promote national reunification activities, and has some influence in San Francisco’s overseas Chinese community,” the Northern California Council candidly notes on its website.’
Around the United States, the councils count numerous prominent Chinese Americans as members. For example, one successful California businesswoman was for years the honorary chairwoman of the council in Northern California.'* While helping promote US-China educational exchanges, this individual has also consistently advocated on behalf of PRC policies in the United States, including China’s claims on Taiwan, and has helped to organize demonstrations against “Taiwan independence.” She is listed as an advisor to the China Overseas Exchange Association, which is part of the United Front Work Department.’
The Chinese government has also sought to co-opt local Chinese American community associations to serve its goals.”° In the past, organizations such as regional associations, known as Tongs (l#4), had generally been close to the Nationalist government of Taiwan. In San Francisco, however, that began to change as early as the 1980s when Soon Suey
Section 3
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