Kenya on Tuesday defended its deportation of two groups of Taiwanese to China after they were acquitted in a cyber crime case, a move that has drawn an angry reaction from Taipei.
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A total of 67 people from Taiwan and mainland China will be deported from Kenya on Wednesday after 10 were sent back at the weekend, the official Xinhua news agency cited police as saying.
In recent years, syndicates led by Taiwanese citizens and based in Southeast Asia, Africa and Oceania have been falsely presenting themselves as law enforcement officers to extort money from people on the Chinese mainland through telephone calls, according to Chinese police.
“In order to get to the bottom of the case, public security authorities are going to investigate the Taiwanese suspects according to the law”.
Over the past eight years, mainland China and Taiwan have put aside political differences to sign agreements, including a 2011 consensus that the two sides would consult each other on crime-related matters.
The group detained in Kenya had operated out of the capital Nairobi and were suspected of cheating victims out of millions of yuan in nine mainland provinces and cities and would be prosecuted there, it added.
Part of Beijing’s approach is to isolate Taiwan internationally, excluding it from global institutions like the United Nations and leaving it with just 22 formal diplomatic allies.
In its defense, Kenya government said the people were in Kenya illegally and were being returned to the last port of entry.
The Chinese government said today that the group of Taiwanese deported from Kenya are wanted for suspected fraud in China.
“They came from China and we took them to China”.
China has praised Kenya for supporting its “one-China policy”.
Defeated Nationalist forces fled to the island in 1949 after the civil war with the Communists who have remained in control in Beijing.
Taiwan is also lodging a suit against Kenyan officials for “forcefully detaining” its people and ignoring an earlier court decision which cleared some of the suspects.
Andrew Hsia Li-yan, chairman of Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, told parliament in Taipei that the adminstration of mainland-friendly President Ma Ying-jeou was “extremely indignant” over the case.
Chen Chun-shen, chief of West Asian and African affairs at Taiwan’s foreign ministry told AFP Kenyan authorities had denied Taiwan representatives from seeing the detainees before they were placed on the China-bound plane.
An Fengshan, a spokesman for the Chinese Cabinet’s Taiwan Affairs Office, reiterated China’s claim to jurisdiction in the case, but also sought to reassure people on the island. “It is important that the Taiwan side does not politicise the matter”.
A group of eight left on Friday and a second group of 37 Taiwanese nationals were in the process of leaving on Tuesday, Taiwan’s Foreign ministry said.
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Hong Kong authorities are still waiting for detailed explanations from China regarding the booksellers, who produced and sold gossipy books critical of Chinese leaders, amid suspicion among some that they were abducted by Chinese agents.
