VIII. The Manipulation of Information 

A. The fake letters from the Prime Minister and the Minister of 

Immigration 

On April 20, 2019, the Tibetan Association of Canada (TAC) was inaugurated in Toronto, 

the latest member of the Confederation of Toronto Chinese Canadian Organizations 

(CTCCO), an umbrella platform of more than 90 organizations with ties to the Chinese 

consulate. It quickly became evident that the TAC was a façade allowing Beijing to circulate 

its narrative on Tibet. Tibetan people were in the minority at the inauguration, and all were 

known for their prior ties to the local United Front department and/or to the Chinese con-

191. “Introduction,” Shandong Friendship Publishing House (https://archive.vn/eYGzH); “Shandong Opens 

Another Nishan House in Germany,” Shandong China Daily (26 Jul. 2018), https://archive.vn/URDWz. 

192. “孔子尼山书屋在澳大利亚标准中文学校揭牌” (“Opening of a Nishan Book House in an Australian 

School of Chinese Language”), 人民网 (People’s Newspaper) (28 Nov. 2014), https://archive.vn/ZBnE6. 

193. “山东友谊出版社有限公司” (“Shandong Friendship Publishing House”), 企查查 (Qichacha) (updated 1 

Feb. 2021), https://archive.vn/mAinj. 

194. “山东出版集团简介” (“Introduction to Shandong Publication Group Co., Ltd.”), 山东出版集团 (Shandong 

Publication Group Co., Ltd.) (no date), https://archive.vn/OiWN3. 

195. “山东出版集团有限公司” (“Shandong Publication Group Co., Ltd”), 企查查 (Qichacha) (updated 3 Feb. 

2021), https://archive.vn/rNBqM. 

196. “Introduction,” Shandong Friendship Publishing House. 

197. “Opening of a Nishan Bookstore in an Australian School of Chinese Language.” 

198. “尼山书屋: 简介” (“Nishan Bookstores: Introduction”), 山东友谊出版社 (Shandong Friendship Publishing 

House) (no date), https://archive.vn/NW2lm.

199. “Shandong Opens Nishan Book House in Canada.”

200. “Shandong Opens Second Nishan Book House in Hungary,” Shandong China Daily (2 Nov. 2018), https://

archive.vn/IMUGe.

201. “Shandong Opens Another Nishan House in Germany.”

202. “中国尼山书屋落户阿联酋迪拜” (“Opening of a New Nishan Bookstore in Dubai”), Xinhuanet (25 Apr. 

2018), https://archive.vn/ZtuRk.

203. “中国尼山书屋在乌干达麦克雷雷大学孔院落户” (“Creation of a Nishan Bookstore in the Confucius 

Institute at Makerere University, in Uganda”), Xinhuanet (12 Nov. 2019), https://archive.vn/kDr9y.

575

sulate. The Chinese national anthem was played, and the director of the new association 

thanked Beijing for the economic development of Tibet. The creation of this group was 

immediately denounced by other Tibetan associations in Canada which highlighted that 

the TAC wasn’t representative and that its creation was certainly motivated by a desire “to 

divide the Tibetan community in Canada.”204

At that precise moment, two letters of endorsement apparently written by Prime 

Minister Justin Trudeau, and his minister of Immigration Ahmed Hussen – both 

rough counterfeits with grammar mistakes – circulated on Facebook and Twitter. 

Several days later, a spokesman for the Prime Minister Office confirmed that the letters had 

been fabricated. In response, the TAC declared that it had nothing to do with the opera-

tion. But, for Jonathan Manthorpe, “this [was] clearly a United Front operation.”205 Other 

sources suggested that it might not have been China but another country, to “add fuel to 

the fire” of bilateral tensions.

B. WeChat’s role

The Chinese phone messaging app WeChat (→ p. 196) is increasingly used in Canada, 

and not solely by the Chinese community: politicians, for instance, are growing more accus-

tomed to using it in Canada, as in the United States, to reach Chinese-speaking voters. 

As noted earlier, WeChat seems systematically used when organizing pro-Beijing 

counter-demonstrations in reaction to events linked to the “five poisons.” Another prob-

lem arises from this: Beijing is permanently censoring content on the app: discus-

sions are monitored and, sometimes, doctored. A professor at a Canadian university shared 

204. “Tibetans in Canada Dismayed by New Chinese-backed Group,” Canada Tibet Committee (23 Apr. 2019). 

205. Jonathan Manthorpe quoted in Limin Zhou, “Fake Letter Sent in Trudeau’s name Not Isolated Case in China’s 

Disinformation Campaign,” The Epoch Times (7 May 2019). 

576

with us that he had noticed, in a closed discussion group of Chinese-speaking students, 

researchers and teachers at the university, that messages, and sometimes entire discussions, 

often disappeared. This was also noted by Freedom House: “in Canada, WeChat censors 

deleted a Member of Parliament’s message to constituents praising Hong Kong’s Umbrella 

Movement protesters, manipulated dissemination of news reports related to Huawei exec-

utive Meng Wanzhou’s arrest, and blocked broader media coverage of Chinese government 

corruption and leading Chinese officials.”206 Beyond intervening on the content, Chinese 

intelligence uses overseas WeChat groups to detect dissidents and gather personal 

data.

Finally, a scandal forced the prime minister to intervene: the 

WeChat account of a Liberal minister was used, without 

her knowledge, to raise funds to finance the legal pro-

ceedings against a journalist critical of Beijing. On April 

30, 2020, the journalist Sam Cooper published on globalnews.

ca an article showing that in mid-January, while China was 

concealing the extent of the coronavirus epidemic that hit it, 

it mobilized its relays around the world to acquire and stock-

pile a gigantic number of personal protective equipment (2.5 

billion in six weeks) such as masks, that consulates in Canada 

relayed these calls and that groups linked to the United Front 

bought and sent to China a large number of these items – 

which a few weeks and months later would be sold at a high 

price by China to the whole world.207 Several members of the 

Chinese Canadian community considered the possibility of a 

class action lawsuit against the journalist and the newspaper.208 

To that end, a person called Maria Xu, a member of Joyce 

Murray’s WeChat group – Vancouver’s Liberal MP, president of the Treasury Board and 

Minister of Digital Government in the Trudeau Cabinet – published a message in the 

group with a link to a website collecting donations to fund this lawsuit. Once it was detected, 

the message was deleted and Maria Xu excluded from the WeChat group. At that point, the 

prime minister intervened to denounce the attacks against the journalist as “absolutely 

unacceptable” and Murray’s office explained that WeChat was “used to engage members of 

the Chinese Canadian community” and that “this particular post was unacceptable and in 

no way reflects the Minister’s views. Participation in this group is guided by posted guide-

lines and a disclaimer. In this case, guidelines were not followed and the individual who 

posted is no longer in this group.” In turn, Global News explained that it was “increasingly 

concerned by what appears to be an organized effort to discredit our journalist, our report-

ing and our news division as we investigate the serious issue of foreign influence in Canadian 

affairs.”209

206. Sarah Cook, Beijing’s Global Megaphone: The Expansion of Chinese Communist Party Media Influence since 2017, 

Freedom House report (Jan. 2020), 18. 

207. Sam Cooper, “United Front Groups in Canada Helped Beijing Stockpile Coronavirus Safety Supplies,” Global 

News (30 Apr. 2020). 

208. Bob Mackin, “Analysis: Facts or Fearmongering? Richmond Politician Links Racist Graffiti, Assaults to Second 

World War Injustice,” The Breaker (24 May 2020).

209. Brian Platt, “Trudeau Condemns Use of Minister’s WeChat Group to Promote Fundraiser to Sue Journalist,” 

National Post (26 May 2020). 

577

VIII. A Myriad of Local Organizations as Relays

In Canada, and particularly in Vancouver and Toronto, there are many Chinese asso-

ciations, organizations and groups. Some are old, such as the Chinese Benevolent 

Association of Vancouver (1896), the Canada-China Friendship Society in Ottawa (1976) 

and the Federation of Canada-China Friendship Associations (1980). And all of them are 

more or less linked to the UFWD, hence to the CCP. The groups “promoting the 

pacific reunification of China,” directly affiliated to the UFWD, are the easiest to uncover. 

For instance, three Vancouver groups belong to that category: the China Unification 

Promotion Council (CANADA) (加拿大中国统一促进会), created in 1999; the Canada 

Chinese Peaceful and Unification Association (加拿大中国和平统一促 进会), cre-

ated in 2003 to help newly arrived migrants, and the president of which, Wang Dianqi (王

典奇), made a name for himself after he convinced a city councilor to raise the Chinese 

flag in front of the Vancouver city hall while wearing a red scarf (which is largely 

interpreted in the Chinese Canadian community as a symbol of loyalty to the Communist 

regime) on the occasion of the 67th anniversary of the PRC210; last but not least, the North 

America China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification (北美

温 哥华中国和平统一促进会), created in 2016. 

On the left, Wang has the Chinese flag raised in front of the Vancouver city hall in 2016.211 On the right, this advertisement was 

printed by the Chinese Benevolent Association of Vancouver in the newspapers Sing Tao and Ming Pao on June 21, 2019.

The 2019 Hong Kong crisis made it easier to clarify, where it was still necessary, how 

a large number of Chinese associations in Canada position themselves toward Beijing. A 

statement released by the Chinese Benevolent Association of Vancouver in June 

2019, and signed by 208 associations, adopted the CCP’s rhetoric almost to the 

word212:

210. Mike Laanela, “Chinese Flags and Red Scarves Spark Debate at Vancouver City Hall,” CBC News (3 Oct. 2016). 

211. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1183465553085644802/photo/1.

212. Chinese Benevolent Association of Vancouver (21 Jun. 2019), https://archive.vn/6WMWg. 

578

As ethnic Chinese and overseas Chinese people residing in Canada, we are all the children of Emperor 

Yan and Emperor Huang [two of China’s mythic founders], we belong to the same Chinese nation, 

based on the idea of blood being thicker than water, patriotism and love of our homeland, we 

are paying a close attention to the development of the current Hong Kong situation, we are obliged 

to unite with the Hong Kong residents and not to be taken advantage of by the separatist forces.213

The list, which was very usefully translated in English,214 gives an overview (probably 

non-exhaustive) of the reach of Chinese influence in the non-profit sector tied to 

Chinese Canadian communities. Among the 208 groups, at least 80 had apparently 

recently been created, “reflecting the huge surge in mainland Chinese migration since about 

2000.”215 If many of the signatories have established ties to the Chinese government, 

a few elements made some observers believe that the letter was guided by Chinese author-

ities, including sentences presenting Hong Kong as “an internal affair of China,” oppos-

ing “the interference of any foreign forces,” and an endorsement of ethnic nationalism 

(Chinese Canadians are “all the children of Emperor Yan and Emperor Huang [two of 

China’s mythic founders],” their “blood being thicker than water”)216 that we mentioned in 

the section dedicated to the diasporas (→ p. 165).

This proliferation of groups made of a multitude of subgroups is a “kind of United 

Front tactic,” according to Fenella Sung of the Canadian Friends of Hong Kong: “it’s 

very easy to form a community group. You do not even have to register. If you’re not 

incorporated, you can just get together [even] two or three people … and form a group.” 

In other words, “it’s really bluffing more than anything. They want to show they are 

stronger and have more people than they really have.”217 Cheuk Kwan, of the Toronto 

Association for Democracy in China added that “these are basically fake organizations.” 

“They are what I call the mouthpieces of the Chinese consulate. This is a very clearly 

United Front effort by the Chinese government.”218

A similar operation was organized globally in August 2019: a statement signed by 583 

Chinese organizations worldwide was circulated by the Chinese embassy in Ottawa,219 

which advertised the involvement of 204 Chinese organizations from Canada.220 Another 

example took place in October 2019 with an ad in the Chinese Canadian Times bought by 

the Council of Newcomer Organizations, a self-described apolitical association subsidized 

by the Canadian government – a detail that caused a public uproar (the spokesperson of 

Canadian Friends of Hong Kong condemned “our government” for “using taxpayers’ 

money to enable CCP influence and infiltration into our society and politics”).221

213. Ian Young, “Canadian Ads Blasted Hong Kong ‘Radicals’, Invoking Blood Loyalty to China. Was Beijing’s 

United Front Involved?” South China Morning Post (7 Jul. 2019). 

214. UFWD YVR, “Pro-CCP Groups of Canada in 2019,” medium.com, (5 Jul. 2019).

215. Young, “Canadian Ads Blasted Hong Kong ‘Radicals.’” 

216. Canadian Coalition, Harassment & Intimidation, 21-22. 

217. Young, “Canadian Ads Blasted Hong Kong ‘Radicals.’”

218. Tom Blackwell, “Open Letter from Chinese-Canadian Groups Boosts Hong Kong government, Blasts 

Protesters,” National Post, (9 Jul. 2019). 

219. “全球近六百家社团发表全球华侨华人严正声明，强烈谴责香港暴乱和颜色革命” (“Nearly 600 

Organizations from All Over the World Condemned the Demonstrations in Honk Kong and the Color Revolutions 

in the Name of Overseas Chinese”), 环球华语融媒体平台 (Global Chinese Convergence Media) (10 Aug. 2019), https:// 

archive.vn/tyqUI. 

220. “加拿大众多华人团体谴责暴力乱港行径 拥护» 一国两制” (“Many Chinese Organizations in Canada 

Condemn the Violence That Creates Chaos in Hong Kong and Endorse the ‘One Country, Two Systems’”), Website 

of the Embassy of China in Canada (6 Aug. 2019), https://archive.vn/GkDzx. 

221. Tom Blackwell, “Hong Kong Democracy Advocates Angry After Ottawa-funded Group Buys Ad Backing 

China’s Side,” National Post (4 Oct. 2019).

579

The Transformation of S.U.C.C.E.S.S.

The United Chinese Community Enrichment Services Society (S.U.C.C.E.S.S.) is an organi-

zation based in Vancouver that provides social services to Chinese immigrants. Created in 

1973, it is one of the largest social services agencies in the country, helping more than 60,000 

persons on a budget of CA$50 million (€32.5 million) granted by the government. For years, 

S.U.C.C.E.S.S. used to denounce the Tian’anmen massacre by signing a joint statement with 

other organizations on the day of the commemoration of the bloody repression. In 2019, 

however, on the 30th anniversary of the event, the organization kept silent – which did not go 

unnoticed.222 But the demographics had changed: more than 40% of its “clients” now come 

from mainland China, and no longer from Hong Kong. 

In recent years, S.U.C.C.E.S.S. apparently turned its back: in 2015, the Overseas Chinese 

Affairs Office (→ p. 69) labeled it an “Overseas Chinese Service Centre” (OCSC). As Matt 

Schrader showed with one Toronto-based OCSC, there are proven ties between the centers 

and the CCP (the Toronto center sent a New Year’s card “on behalf of the Consul General 

of the PRC” that included praise for the 19th CCP Congress and, the year before, hosted 

a welcome banquet for the new consul general during which Lin Xingyong, the president 

of the Confederation of Toronto Chinese Canadian Organizations, declared that “[We 

will] give Consul He our strongest support and cooperation”).223 The decision to label 

S.U.C.C.E.S.S. an OCSC wasn’t anodyne. In fact, the agency also opened an office in Beijing 

and its members are increasingly parading with diplomats from the Chinese consulate and 

other pro-Beijing communitarian groups. As such, many of those who had known and 

respected the work of this agency in previous decades are now surprised and disappointed 

by this evolution. 

The Australian precedent is interesting here: the equivalent of S.U.C.C.E.S.S. in Australia, the 

Chinese Australian Services Society, based in Sidney, was also labeled an OCSC.224 As a con-

sequence perhaps, it started to get involved in foreign policy matters in 2017, with a paper 

suggesting that Australia should reconsider its “strategic alignment with the United States” and 

develop its relations with China instead.

Meeting between Sing Lim Yeo, then-president of the S.U.C.C.E.S.S. Foundation, and Qin Yuanping (裘援平), 

president of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office, 

at Vancouver’s Shangri-La (Feb. 2014).225

222. Douglas Quan, “Silence on Tian’anmen Anniversary Could be Sign of China’s Influence on Canadian 

Community Groups: Critics,” National Post (17 Jun. 2019). All the quotes in this section are taken from this document. 

223. Matt Schrader, “‘Chinese Assistance Centers’ Grow United Front Work Department Global Presence,” China 

Brief, 19:1 (4 Jan. 2019). 

224. “海外华助中心: 有它就有家 华侨华人什么都不怕” (“The Overseas Chinese Service Centers is Like 

Family, Overseas Chinese Have Nothing to Fear Anymore”), 国务院侨务办公室 (Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the 

State Council) (6 Apr. 2014), https://archive.vn/o8jXG. 

225. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1140782943943577600. 

580

In March 2019, three Canadian representatives of local organizations were in 

Beijing as delegates to the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference 

(CPPCC): Chen Yongtao (陈永涛), president of the Vancouver-based Canadian Alliance 

of Chinese Associations, Wang Linan (王立楠), president of the Canada Shandong 

General Chamber of Commerce, also in Vancouver, and Lin Xingyong (林性勇), pres-

ident of the Confederation of Toronto Chinese Canadian Organizations.226 Ling Yin, 

the publisher of Sept Days, a weekly Chinese-language newspaper based in Montreal, 

also attended. In an interview for the website Chinaqw.com, he explained that the role 

of overseas Chinese (like him) was to “tell the history of China” to foreign readers and 

governments.227 When, later that same month, Zhang Yunbo, president of the Toronto-

based Greater Northwest China Federation of Entrepreneurial Businesses in Canada, 

was also in China for an event in the Shaanxi province, he granted an interview to a 

government website in which he said that “to expand abroad, we need to be able to tell 

a good story about China.”228

The three Canadian delegates among others at the CPPCC.229

Each year, new organizations are created. Between October and December 2018, 

for instance, the Federation of Transoceanic Chinese Canadian Association (FTCCA), 

in Toronto, was created to “strengthen economic relations between Canada and China”; 

its members “will have the opportunity to participate and experience exclusive visits 

and tours to China.”230 The logo of the FTCCA actually resembles that of the All-China 

Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese (ACFROC), a major United Front organiza-

tions.

226. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1103128291433537536.

227. “全国政协报告中的这些话 受到侨胞广泛关注” (“These Words in the CCPPC Report Have Drawn Quite 

Some Attention from Overseas Chinese”), 中国侨网 (4 March 2019), https://archive.vn/U5p9u. 

228. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1114971300198359041. 

229. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1103128291433537536/photo/2.

230. Federation of Transoceanic Chinese Canadian Association (FTCCA), “Mission” (https://archive.vn/nHEA2). 

581

The organization’s inaugural event, in October 2018, gave an opportunity to United 

Front agents from the consulate (Yang Baohua (杨葆华) and Li Sining (李斯宁)) to be in 

the same room as Canadian politicians.231 

Meanwhile, in Vancouver, Wang Dianqi (王典奇), who was already “simultaneously head 

of three CCP United Front groups”232 in the city, formally created a fourth, the Chinese 

Cultural Harmony and Unity Society of Canada, ostensibly to “study and spread a specific 

facet of Xi Jinping thought (和合文化).” In reality, Hu Qiquan (胡启全), the consular 

attaché in charge of political warfare, took part to the initial activities of the new organiza-

tion and, soon after, Wang Dianqi travelled to China with the local politician Al Richmond 

(→ p. 561), where he met with United Front agents.233

Wang Dianqi and Al Richmond in Ningbo, in November 2018.234

In December 2018, the Canada-China New Era Cultural and Economic Development 

Association (加拿大中国新时代文化经贸促进会) and the Canada Fujian Industry & 

Commerce Association (CFICA) were similarly created in Vancouver. 

231. UFWD YVR, “Reds vs. Reds,” 

232. The Canada Chinese Peaceful and Unification Association, the Canadian Alliance of Chinese Associations, 

and the Canada China City Friendship Association. 

233. UFWD YVR, “Reds vs. Reds.” 

234. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1072978867717951489/photo/2. 

582

A public holiday to commemorate the Nanjing massacre

In October 2017, the legislative assembly of Ontario adopted a motion introduced by MP Soo 

Wong (she was born in Hong Kong and moved to Canada at eight) that designated December 

13 as a day of commemoration for the Nanjing massacre. In 2018, several organizations235 

took part to a campaign to convince the federal government to create a public holiday to com-

memorate it. It was relayed by Jenny Kwan, a New Democratic Party MP who represents East 

Vancouver in the Canadian parliament. Her speech, in July 2018, stirred a controversy; and 

Japanese and Japanese Canadians, among others, protested. She has not been met with success 

for now. Nonetheless, several months later, in October 2018, Kwan inaugurated a monument 

dedicated to the victims of the Nanjing massacre, in the Richmond Hill neighborhood of 

Toronto – the first outside of China – with two organizations (Confederation of Toronto 

Chinese Canadian Organizations and Chinese Freemasons of Canada (Toronto)). 

Jenny Kwan and CACA members, including its president Chen Yongtao, demonstrated for the creation of a com-

memorative public holiday in front of the Parliament of Canada, in late November 2018.236

In August 2018, the creation of an association of PLA veterans residing in Canada, 

the Canada Chinese Veteran’s Society, led to protests. Sherman Lai, himself a PLA veteran 

(lieutenant-colonel) teaching at the royal military college in Kingston, Ontario, held that 

“they took advantage of democracy, of the Canadian system … But communism, the PLA 

is not compatible with democracy and the rule of law. Before their nostalgia, there is a very 

bloody history,” including the intervention of Canadian troops during the Korean War.237 

Others called out the PLA for its role in state repression, from Tian’anmen to Hong Kong 

demonstrations, without forgetting Tibet and Xinjiang for instance. The association, which 

organized events, created a choir called “Companions in arms,” for instance, which 

performed in military uniforms and sang military patriotic songs during a festival 

in Richmond (British Columbia) in October 2019 (see image below). The association had 

apparently disbanded in June 2020.238

235. Including the Canadian Alliance of Chinese Associations, the Canadian Sichuanese Friendship Association 

and the Canada Chinese Peaceful Reunification Association. 

236. https://twitter.com/Plan200_ca/status/1070540018861584384. 

237. Tom Blackwell, “Canadian Veterans of People’s Liberation Army Form Association, Sing of China’s Martial 

Glory,” National Post (30 Oct. 2019). 

238. Government of Canada, Federal Corporation Information 1093250-7 (https://bit.ly/2YDu1dC). 

583

Canadian Veterans of the PLA Association (https://archive.vn/TPrTE). 

IX. Seducing First Nations

Chinese authorities in Canada are engaged in a strategy of seduction of First Nations 

that could be used to divide the Canadian society. They play on the proximity between 

Chinese immigrants and First Nations, which both assert they are victims of discrimina-

tions in Canada. 

This can be done in subtle ways, as with the Musqueam, an Aboriginal population 

in the Vancouver area. Some of them have Chinese ancestry because, from the early 20th 

century to the 1970s, Chinese migrants from Guangdong lived and worked on farms on 

the reserve and had children with Musqueam women. Two documentaries – Peeking into the 

Pink Houses at Musqueam: A Migration Story (a short movie by Sarah Ling, 2015) and All Our 

Father’s Relations (a feature film by Alejandro Yoshizawa, 2016) – tell the story of one of 

these mixed families, the Grants, brothers and sisters who shared a Chinese father and a 

Musqueam mother. 

The synopsis of the second film announced to the viewers that, “as far back as the 19th 

century, relations between Chinese and First Nations in Canada were often respectful and 

mutually beneficial; both peoples supported one another in the face of marginalization 

and racism.”239 This bilingual production, in English and Chinese, recorded the family when 

they travelled to China in 2013 and first visited the village in the Guangdong province that 

239. All our Father’s Relations, “Film Synopsis” (http://allourfathersrelations.com/synopsis). 

584

their father had left almost a century before. The trip was financed by the Chinese consulate 

in Vancouver, which also provided translators for two days. In February 2015, Consul General 

Liu Fei also “presented a cheque to Howard Grant [one of the Musqueam brothers of Chinese 

origin] in support of the Musqueam-Chinese history project at the UBC Longhouse.”240

The consul general Liu Fei “presenting a check” to Howard Grant in February 2015.241

Larry Grant, one of the sons, explained that “the family was considered Chinese (liv-

ing) abroad” by the consulate.242 The movie also received a CA$20,000 (€13,000) grant 

from the province of British Columbia through the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of 

BC.243 At the ceremony where the grant was announced, Consul General Liu Fei declared 

that “this event formally recognizes the Chinese migrants’ relations with the First Nations 

people, who buried some of the Chinese on their own land and set up families with the 

Chinese who faced hard labor and lack of rights in this land.”244

On the left, the consul general Liu Fei with the Minister of Justice, Jody Wilson-Raybould, and members of the Grant family, 

during the projection of the movie All Our Father’s Relations at the Musqueam Community Center, in Vancouver, on March 

14, 2017.245 On the right, a delegation of 44 Chinese students of the joined MBA program between the University of British 

Columbia and Jiao-tong University in Shanghai visited the Musqueam reserve near Vancouver, in 2019.246

240. Pacific Canada Heritage Centre – Museum of Migration, “CG Liu Fei of YVR Chinese Consulate presents 

cheque to Howard Grant in support of Musqueam-Chinese history project” (24 Feb. 2015), https://archive.vn/y9afz. 

241. Ibid. 

242. Florence Hwang, “Film Explores Historical Relations Between Musqueam First Nation and Chinese,” The 

Source (24 Jan. – 7 Feb. 2017). 

243. “New Film to Tell Shared History of B.C. First Nations and Chinese Canadians,” KelownaNow (12 Aug. 2015). 

244. Hatty Liu, “Chinese-1st Nations History Explored,” China Daily USA (20 Aug. 2015).

245. PRC Consulate General in Vancouver, “Consul General LIU Fei Attends Screening of ‘All Our Fathers’s 

Relations,’” (17 Mar. 2017), https://archive.vn/iikNK. 

246. Ibid. 

The history of the Grant family is endearing, and there is no doubting the sincerity of 

anyone, including at the Chinese consulate. But this example pertains to a larger strategy of 

seducing First Nations. The Musqueam case is specific because some are consid-

ered “almost Chinese.” In August 2016, the consul general organized a meeting between 

Musqueam individuals and Sino-Canadian entrepreneurs.247 In 2019, the joint international 

MBA program of the University of British Columbia (UBC) and Jiao-tong University, in 

Shanghai, sent some Chinese students spend two weeks in Vancouver. In fact, since 2019, 

an “introduction to the heritage of the Musqueam autochthone nation” was added to their 

curriculum, during which Larry Grand tells them his personal history.248 

The consulate has not forgotten the other commu-

nities. In December 2015, the consul general Liu Fei 

met Grand Chief Edward John249 of the Tl’azt’en 

Nation. He is one of Canada’s main autochthonous 

political leaders and married to a former Musqueam 

chief. The Secwepemc are also wooed, especially Mike 

Archie, the former Secwepemc chief in Canim Lake 

(BC). In late January 2019, he was invited to China by 

the CPAFFC (Chinese People’s Association for 

Friendship with Foreign Countries), first to Hefei, to danse at “The Belt and Road World 

Dance Conference,” and then to Beijing. The objective was to show a particular proximity 

between Canadian First Nations and China, as made evident by the media coverage of Mike 

Archie’s trip, which stated that “we established a friendship with Chinese people from 

China who participated in mining gold panning and building railways more than 

160 years ago” (which implied that they were both exploited by English Canadians), and 

that “the visit showed how the BRI brings together world cultures,” with many pictures to 

support that idea.250

The Canadian sanctions against the PRC adopted in March 2021, in response to 

serious and systematic human rights abuses in Xinjiang, provided Beijing with an 

opportunity to capitalize on the parallelism between the Chinese and First Nations. 

247. PRC Consulate general in Vancouver, “Consul General LIU Fei Met with Musqueam Indian Band and Local 

Chinese Canadian Entrepreneurs” (8 Aug.2016), https://archive.vn/dweCg). 

248. “IMBA students From China Visit Musqueam Traditional Territory to Explore Vancouver’s Indigenous 

Roots,” University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business (16 May 2019). 

249. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China, “Consul General LIU Fei Met with Friends 

from BC First Nations (from Chinese consulate General in Vancouver)” (16 Dec. 2015), https://archive.vn/6bP4j. 

250. “促进中加两国人文交流，加拿大原住民酋长访华收获颇丰” (“To Promote Humanist Exchanges 

Between China and Canada, Canadian Autochthonous Chiefs Have Led a Fructuous Visit to China”), 中华新闻社 

(China News) (1 Feb. 2019), https://archive.vn/JKCPu. 

586

In a long list of crimes committed by the very people who are giving lessons today (in 

this case European, British and Canadian people, who announced sanctions in a coordi-

nated fashion on March 22, 2021), the spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign 

Affairs recalled that, in the 1870s, the Canadian government had implemented a policy of 

“assimilation of indigenous people” and of “cultural genocide.”251 This way of turning 

the accusation around, a Tu quoque (you too) fallacy, is not new: a month earlier, on 

Twitter, she already stated that the allegations of genocide in Xinjiang were a lie, but that 

“genocide did take place in Canada.”

Moreover, since one of the human rights abuses Beijing is accused of in Xinjiang is 

the forced sterilization of Uyghur women, the adoption by the Canadian Parliament 

of a motion condemning the PRC on February 22 also sparked controversy in Canada. 

Indigenous advocacy groups accused the federal government of having imple-

mented similar measures against them in the past. Of course, these groups did not 

need Beijing to draw the parallel and express public outrage, but one can assume that their 

mobilization was seen at the Chinese embassy in Ottawa not only as an opportunity to fan 

the flames of this anger, but also as another reason to maintain close relations with 

indigenous communities.

X. The Canadian case illustrates the russification of Chinese 

influence operations 

The preceding pages show that, as Charles Burton said, “there are strong circumstan-

tial indications that Chinese influence operations have been notably successful in 

Canada,”252 but also that, not unlike what happened in Sweden, we can see the early 

stages of a Russification of these influence operations. Indeed, in Canada, Beijing 

251. “Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying’s remarks on Xinjiang-related issues,” ambassade de 

la RPC au Canada, 24 mars 2021 (https://archive.vn/wIqQW).

252. Burton, “Recent PRC Influence Operations,” 10. 

587

does not stop at modeling the national debate on China, censoring the “five poison” 

through pressure on media, and interfering with schools and universities for instance. 

It also targets the Canadian society and its government in an attempt to divide the pop-

ulation. For now, like in Sweden, it remains at an intermediate stage where the 

negative discourse is still linked to China (i.e. it mirrors a positive narrative that 

is about China). 

Some attacks are anecdotic. For example, they have instrumentalized the legalization 

of marijuana: Chinese media alerted Chinese Canadians to the dangers of marijuana-filled 

candies on their children.253 There are several possible explanations: to try to draw Chinese 

communities in Canada away from Ottawa (by creating mistrust) and closer to Beijing (by 

playing the values card); to show that Beijing cares about the well-being of its “flock” all 

around the world, regardless of citizenship, and that there is therefore a form of ethnic sol-

idarity; but also, according to some, because Beijing does not rule out developing a cannabis 

industry one day: it is therefore in its interest to limit the success of Canadian cannabis in 

order to export some. 

Cannabis is one of the potentially divisive issues that may put the Chinese com-

munity at odds with its host country Canada. But there are additional buttons in 

Beijing’s arsenal, including same-sex marriage, real estate investments, shark fins (a picture 

of Vancouver’s Richmond MP Alice Wong eating a shark fin soup caused a controversy in 

2012) and, obviously, the purported Sinophobia of Canadians and their government. 

Rightly or wrongly, many Chinese Canadians (like their Australian counterparts) 

feel discriminated. Then, Chinese authorities and their proxies (associations, entrepre-

neurs, and students) have an easy time coming to their rescue with a twofold message. First, 

racial unity. The language used in the June 2019 statement about Hong Kong, which was 

signed by more than 200 pro-Beijing associations (→ p. 577) wasn’t anodyne: it explicitly 

called for racial unity, invoking the Chinese “blood” tying foreigners of Chinese 

descent, including Canadians, to the population of mainland China. Bill Chu, of 

the Canadians for Reconciliation Society, was right to point out that “it’s divisive to say the 

least. It’s trying to shift our allegiance from one country [Canada] to another [China].”254 

This is precisely their objective: to convince Chinese Canadians that they are closer to 

Beijing than to Ottawa. The same logic was rolled out for First Nations which share, if 

not the same blood (as is the case of some Musqueam people), at least the same position 

as victims. 

Second, this narrative highlights the CCP’s importance: “you are being discriminated and 

the solution to that is to have a powerful motherland – China. But without the CCP, your 

motherland will be weak. In other words, your ability to stand tall as a Canadian depends 

on the CCP, not your own ability or the values of Canadian society.”255 Sometimes, the 

message is subtle, internalizing the liberal thought: “you do not need to be with us, and we 

can keep our political, ideological, cultural differences. You do not need to embrace the 

CCP but, as we share the same blood, belong to the same group, we will help you.” This 

powerful message can bear fruits. Hence, Sinophobia is dangerous as it provides China 

with opportunities for influence operations.

253. Interview between one of the authors and a Canadian journalist of Chinese descent, in Vancouver (Apr. 2019).

254. Young, “Canadian Ads Blasted Hong Kong ‘Radicals.’”

255. “Infiltration,” Ask Politicians about CCP (Canadian Friends of Hong Kong), https://www.askpoliticiansccp. 

org/infiltration. 

588

Other attacks occurred during the Huawei affair, for instance to turn the stigma 

around: has Canada really respected the rule of law that it claims to champion when it 

arrested Meng? Was this arrest really compatible with the democratic and liberal values that 

Ottawa is supposed to uphold?

As with Russian operations,256 divisions are envisioned as both internal (here, divid-

ing the Canadian society, particularly the Chinese community from the rest) and external 

(amplifying potential tensions between a country and its neighbors). The Huawei case 

certainly allowed Beijing to maintain and deepen existing tensions between Canada 

and the United States by spreading the narrative that, contrary to appearances, this was 

not a problem between Canada and China but between Canada and the United States, 

with Ottawa unwillingly finding itself in the crossfire of a Chinese-American cold war 

after it bowed to pressure from Washington to stop Meng. Beijing exploited the growing 

anti-American sentiment in Canada by circulating the idea that Washington “threw Canada 

under the bus.” Furthermore, it played on moral equivalences: China is tough, but so is 

the United States, and Canada is the victim. This strategy began at the start of the scandal, 

and received somewhat encouraging news in late October 2020 when the Supreme Court 

of British Columbia authorized Meng Wanzhou’s lawyers to plead that Canada had been 

dupped by the United States in obtaining her arrest.257

For now, Chinese operations in Canada remain tied to the Chinese community. 

But their progressive Russification implies their future “desinization” – the oper-

ations will probably grow beyond issues of interest to the community to target societal 

issues that concern all Canadians. This is already apparent in the use of English-language 

media to try to reach, on the one hand, Chinese Canadians who do not speak Chinese, 

such as second or third generation immigrants and, on the other hand, all Canadians. It is 

then important to underline, as Jonathan Manthorpe did, that Chinese Canadians are not 

the only ones targeted: “Non-Chinese Canadians are just as likely to be recruited as 

agents of influence by the United Front and Beijing’s other intelligence services. 

Indeed, because of naïveté, ignorance, or sheer venality, non-Chinese Canadians are often 

easy recruits for Beijing. Chinese immigrants are more experienced with the regime most 

of them have come to Canada to escape.”258

256. Jean-Baptiste Jeangène Vilmer, Alexandre Escorcia, Marine Guillaume, and Janaina Herrera, Information 

Manipulation: A Challenge for Our Democracies, report from the Center for analysis, prevision and strategy (CAPS) of the 

Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs and the Institute for Strategic Research of the Ministry for the Armed Forces 

(IRSEM), Paris (Aug. 2018), 69-70. 

257. Timothé Matte-Bergeron, “La Cour permet à Meng Wanzhou de presenter une autre defense” (“The Court 

Allowed Meng Wanzhou to Submit another Defense”), Radio Canada (29 Oct. 2020). 

258. Manthorpe, Claws of the Panda, 166. 

589

Chapter 6

THE INFEKTION 2.0 OPERATION 

DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC (2020)

The exact origin of the pandemic remains unknown at the time of writing, and for good 

reason, as Beijing still refuses an independent investigation.1 But it appears that the SARS-

CoV-2 virus was found in the Hubei province (central China) as early as October 2019.2 The 

magnitude and prevalence of the contaminations rapidly unsettled healthcare systems and 

the societies hit by the virus. And, in the political sphere, the pandemic has already taught us 

a lot. For observers of China, it revealed obvious elements that had long been forgotten and 

it undermined the prevalent common sense. For instance, the weight of local institutions in 

the Chinese political model, a legacy of a singular state trajectory, came to the fore; the local 

state appeared for what it has always been: a political level resistant to the ambitions of the 

center, quick to scupper the policies decided by the Party.3 This could be seen in the clashes 

between the Hubei and Jiangxi police forces after the lockdown was lifted for the inhabitants 

of Wuhan.4 The crisis provoked by the virus has also prompted us to qualify the analyses of 

those presenting Xi Jinping as a new hegemonic Mao, perhaps forgetting too hastily that Xi’s 

accumulation of power has not entirely eliminated the internal rivalries, the deleterious effect 

of the suspension of the rules of devolution of power and the gradual induration of a state 

apparatus distraught by the campaign against corruption.5

As it was probed by its population and the international community, the CCP quickly 

reacted by conducting several informational operations simultaneously, some carry-

ing a positive message (championing its management of the crisis and, as such, its polit-

ical model) and others with a negative narrative (attacks against other states, especially 

Western states, for their inability to manage the virus, or even for an alleged responsibility in 

its apparition). On this latter point, Beijing circulated a rumor stating that the virus had 

originated in the United States, and not in China. The present case study investigates 

this singular operation. Without any hint to its “true” code name, if one was ever assigned, 

and because it appears as a sort of replica of the KGB-led Infektion Operation in the 

1980s with which the Soviets tried to make people believe that AIDS was US-made, we 

named this operation “Infektion 2.0.”6 The present study focuses on the first phase of the 

1. “‘Nous souhaitons une enquête sur les origines de la pandémie de Covid-19 approfondie et crédible’” (“We Want 

an In-Depth and Credible Investigation into the Origins of the Covid-19 Pandemic”), Le Monde (4 Mar. 2021). 

2. Jonathan Pekar et al., “Timing the SARS-CoV-2 Index Case in Hubei province,” Science (18 Mar. 2021).

3. Yves Chevrier discusses “the weakness of strong state” instead of “the crisis of a weak state.” See: Yves Chevrier, 

L’Empire terrestre [The Land Empire], (TBP). 

4. Lea Li, “Police, Public Clash Over Border Reopening in China,” Inkstone (30 Mar. 2020). 

5. On that note, the decision by the very official Qiushi (Seeking Truth) journal to publish a speech delivered by Xi 

Jinping on January 7 was puzzling, as it implicitly highlighted the absence of measures taken by the Party’s Secretary 

General between January 7 and January 20, even though he was then in charge of the coronavirus (https://archive.

vn/afirR). 

6. This chapter was adapted from Paul Charon, L’opération “Covid-19”: un approfondissement de la russianisation des 

campagnes de désinformation chinoises, IRSEM research paper, April 7, 2020, not published. This paper was diffused 

590

operation, which occurred over a month, between February 22 and March 23, 2020. The 

CCP-led disinformation went on afterward, but this first sequence adequately illustrates the 

similarities between the KGB-led Infektion Operation in 1983 and Infektion 2.0. 

I. The Chinese informational war on the coronavirus

We delineated three components in the CCP’s informational war on the coronavi-

rus, which were deployed simultaneously and are identified here without hierarchy between 

them. 

A. Controlling the hemorrhage 

The Party’s first informational objective was to control narratives internally. At the 

very start of the crisis, local and, later, central authorities tried to silence the pandemic by 

jailing whistleblowers like doctor Li Wenliang (李文亮),7 and by imposing a tight control 

over traditional media outlets and social networks.8 Faced with the evident failure of this 

strategy, which probably turned the epidemic into a pandemic, and with the growing dis-

belief of the population – Chinese citizens compared the coronavirus to Chernobyl9 – the 

Party focused on highlighting its efficiency in managing the crisis, thus building a 

more positive narrative on what was happening. Hence, sustaining the regime was the pri-

ority: the CCP-led operation opted to flood Chinese citizens with multiple (and some-

times contradictory) counter-narratives in order to make them doubt its responsibility: 

the Party was presented as a simple victim. 

B. “Turning the stigma over”

The second act in this informational strategy relied on the tools of the Chinese public 

diplomacy. They tried to demonetize critical voices in Western media that highlighted 

the Chinese government’s incompetence during the first weeks of the pandemic. At that 

point, the narrative endorsed by Beijing stressed that, through the adoption of radical mea-

sures, China had given time for the rest of the world to get ready for the crisis. China also 

branded itself as a global savior that provided many countries with medical equipment. The 

use of icons was fundamental to accompany the construction of a narrative presenting 

China at the bedside of the world, as illustrated by the Italian examples below. Hence, the 

Chinese campaign was a solid case of “turning the stigma over,” an expression coined by 

Erving Goffman,10 to construct the image of a benevolent China (ethos). 

internally (to several ministries) but leaked (not by IRSEM) to Pierre Alonso, who reviewed it in “La Chine à l’école 

russe de la désinformation” (“China at the Russian School of Disinformation”), Libération (9 Mar. 2021).

7. Alice Su, “A doctor Was Arrested for Warning China About the Coronavirus. Then he Died of It,” Los Angeles 

Times (6 Feb. 2020). 

8. Sarah Cook, “ANALYSIS: In a Public Health Crisis, Beijing Sees a Political Threat,” China Media Bulletin, 142 

(Mar. 2020). 

9. Jane Li, “Chinese People are Using ‘Chernobyl’ to Channel Their Anger About the Coronavirus Outbreak,” 

Quartz (27 Jan. 2020). 

10. Erving Goffman, Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity) (Paris: Minuit, 1975). 

591

A similar campaign was observed in several European countries such as Spain11 or Serbia 

(→ p. 383).12 In France, the Chinese embassy circulated the same message of solidar-

ity: China helps European countries. The embassy and the Chinese government commu-

nicated intensively on the masks provided by China to France. And the Twitter accounts 

of the embassy and consulates relayed ceaselessly the messages of the Party.13 This PR 

campaign targeted the entire French population but the Chinese diaspora more specifically, 

as shown by the articles that circulated on WeChat.14

11. Pablo M. Diez, “China Lanza la ‘Diplomacia de Las Mascarillas’ Para Mejorar su Imagen” (“China Launches 

the ‘Face Mask Diplomacy’ to Improve its Image”), ABC (1 Apr. 2020). 

12. “Serbia Sets the Stage for Beijing’s Mask Diplomacy,” AFP (2 Apr. 2020). 

13. François Bougon and Mathieu Suc, “En pleine pandémie, une ambiance de guerre froide” (“A Cold War 

Atmosphere Amidst the Pandemic”), Mediapart (30 Mar. 2020). 

14. “血库告急! 为救重症患者，法国连军机也用上了! 外长: 中国百万口罩援助来了” (“Blood Banks in 

despair! To Save the Sickest Patients, Military Planes are Mobilized in France! The Minister of Foreign Affairs: China 

is Sending Millions of Masks to Help You”), 欧洲时报 (News from Europe) (19 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/58Ukn. 

592

Yet, the Chinese government did not stop at this “mask diplomacy” nourished with a 

particular iconography and repeated propaganda messages. On March 15, a spokesperson 

for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs posted a video on Twitter showing Romans 

thanking China for its help and playing the Chinese national anthem (see images 

below). But an Italian factchecking website showed that it was a montage.15 The Romans 

seen on the video had come together to thank healthcare workers, not China. In fact, the 

video circulated by the Chinese government was a fake made from two videos posted by 

the Corriere della Sera the previous day, and none of them advertised the Chinese anthem or 

any “thank you” to China. The sound was actually added on the original videos.16 With that, 

the Chinese authorities tried to manipulate European public opinions. 

C. Discrediting adversaries

This aspect of the informational strategy consisted in accusing other countries, 

beginning with the United States, of being responsible for the sanitary crisis linked 

to the coronavirus.17 China took advantage of an ideal timing: as the first country hit by 

the virus, it was logically the first country to (presumably) control it. Then, it used a flurry 

of tools to propagate a narrative meant to weaken its adversaries. At that point, Europe 

and North America were busy managing the urgency of the sanitary crisis and could not 

dedicate resources to counter this narrative with the strength it would have required. 

15. David Puente, “Coronavirus. La Propaganda Cinese e il Montaggio Fake Del Video ‘Grazie Cina’” (“ 

Coronavirus. Chinese Propaganda and Fake Editing of the ‘Thank You China’ video”), Open, (20 Mar. 2020). 

16. “Il Video che Mostra la Propaganda Cinese Sull’italia e il Covid-19” (“Video Showing Chinese Propaganda 

About Italy and Covid-19”), Pagella Politica (20 Mar. 2020). 

17. David Gilbert, “Beijing is Pushing a Conspiracy Theory That the US Army Brought the Coronavirus to China,” 

Vice (13 Mar. 2020). 

593

The CCP did not limit itself to vague insinuations. It put together a robust disinfor-

mation campaign that could resist initial fact-checking, to make people believe in an 

American origin to the coronavirus. This Chinese operation reminded us of the Infektion 

Operation set up by Service A of the KGB18 during the 1980s to propagate the idea that 

the HIV virus had been conceived by the U.S. government to target African Americans 

and homosexuals. 

II. The Soviet “Infektion” Operation: a Model for China? 

Cold War specialists often point to a major difference between Western and Eastern 

intelligence services: while the former were primarily tasked with collecting intelligence, 

the latter dedicated a colossal part of their resources to disinformation, what the Soviets 

called dezinformatsiya, an element of the larger “active measures” (aktivnyye meropriata).19 Each 

KGB “residency” abroad had officers tasked with those missions. In fact, their internal 

notation was almost exclusively based on their ability to suggest disinformation operations 

taking advantage of the fault lines in their assigned countries. Moreover, unlike the U.S. sys-

tem, and more broadly Western countries, where “covert actions” were designed as excep-

tional, Soviet “active measures” were largely integrated into the foreign policy of the 

USSR.20 All Party organs had to ensure that the operations were successful.

The “Infektion” Operation (which was apparently named “Denver” by East Germany’s 

intelligence)21 was likely motivated by degrading East-West relations in the late 1970s and 

early 1980s.22 Faced with Reagan’s efforts to exhaust the Soviet regime, Andropov, the 

former head of the KGB, responded with swollen aggressivity and more “active measures” 

operations. 

Beginning in the 1950s, the Soviets launched large-scale disinformation operations that 

exploited the fear of chemical and bacteriological weapons that had taken hold of Western 

public opinions.23 During the 1970s, the field was even more favorable in the United States, 

where the media had revealed biological warfare programs of the U.S. army, including at 

Fort Detrick, in Maryland. When the HIV virus emerged, in the early 1980s, the Soviets 

immediately took the opportunity to launch a disinformation operation to make peo-

ple believe that the U.S. Army was responsible for AIDS, presented as a biological weapon 

conceived to target African Americans and homosexuals. 

The actual operation began on July 17, 1983, with a letter published in the Indian 

newspaper The Patriot, created in 1962 by the KGB to propagate fake information use-

ful to the USSR’s interests.24 The document was signed by an anonymous U.S. scientist but 

18. Service A was tasked with disinformation and subversion operations. 

19. Richard H. Shultz, Roy Godson, Dezinformatsia, The Strategy of Soviet Disinformation (New York: Berkley Books, 

1986); Thomas Rid, Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare (New York: Farrar, 

Straus et Giroux, 2020). 

20. Thomas Boghardt, “Soviet Bloc Intelligence and Its AIDS Disinformation Campaign,” Studies in Intelligence, 53:4 

(Dec. 2009). 

21. Douglas Selvage, “Operation ‘Denver:’ The East German Ministry of State Security and the KGB’s AIDS 

Disinformation Campaign, 1985–1986 (Part 1),” Journal of Cold War Studies, 21:4 (2019), 71-123. 

22. Boghardt, “Soviet Bloc Intelligence.” 

23. Ibid. 

24. “Soviet Influence Activities: A Report on Active Measures and Propaganda, 1986 – 87,” United States Department 

of State (Aug. 1987). 

594

actually manufactured by the KGB, and it affirmed that AIDS resulted from experimenta-

tions in biological warfare conducted by the U.S. Army. 

For two years, there was no particular development in this operation, until September 

1985 when the KGB instructed Eastern European services to propagate the fake 

information published in The Patriot.25 In October 1985, the KGB organized the reproduc-

tion of the article from The Patriot in a Moscow newspaper it controlled, the Literaturnaya 

Gazeta.

In August 1986, the operation took another turn with the Stasi’s involvement, including 

its Division X, in charge of disinformation. During the Summit of Non-Aligned Countries, 

German intelligence services circulated an article written by two biologists, Jakob and Lili 

Segal, untitled “AIDS: Its Nature and Origin.” This article offered a scientific basis to 

allegations initially published in The Patriot. For months, these arguments were relayed 

ceaselessly by Soviet and foreign media (newspapers, magazines, radios, TV channels) and 

the couple of biologists was introduced as French scientists. This was how the operation 

got traction: hundreds of newspapers, many of them without any tie to the Soviet 

Union, covered the narrative fabricated by the KGB, sometimes including information 

that was not in the original document. For instance, several articles insisted that AIDS was 

the result of a plot whereas others described it as an accident in U.S. research on biological 

weapons. The “theory” continued to spread and found additional relays in the U.S. 

radical Left. The Covert Action Information Bulletin, which investigated U.S. covert operations, 

covered the Soviet story and contributed to its prevalence among the U.S. Left.26 On March 

30, 1987, the narrative fabricated by the KGB reached the primetime show hosted 

by Dan Rather on CBS News, which gave another considerable breath of fresh air to the 

operation. 

The Soviet campaign had an immense impact, especially in Africa and in certain 

segments of the U.S. population where the theory continues to circulate today. In 

2005, for instance, the rapper Kanye West mentionned it in his song “Heard ‘EM Say.” 

Nowadays, this is a textbook case which probably inspired the Russians in their dis-

information campaign targeting vaccines and which now seems to feed the Chinese 

approach on disinformation.

In a series of investigative reports published in The New York Times in 2018, Adam B. 

Ellick, Adam Westbrook and Jonah M. Kessel tried to reconstruct the Soviet methodol-

ogy of disinformation.27 They identified a seven-step process: 

• Primo, identify weaknesses in the target country, dissents or fault lines that could be 

accentuated and exploited by the Soviet Union. 

• Secundo, create a lie so big that no one could figure out that it was fabricated. 

• Tertio, add a portion of truth to the lie to make the entire message more believable. 

Ladislav Bittman, deputy-head of the Disinformation Department in the Czechoslovakian 

25. “KGB, Information Nr. 2955 (to Bulgarian State Security)” (7 Sep. 1985), History and Public Policy Program Digital 

Archive, Committee for Disclosing the Documents and Announcing the Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State 

Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Army (CDDAABCSSISBNA-R), f. 9, op. 4, a.e. 663, 

pp. 208-9. Obtained by Christopher Nehring and translated by Douglas Selvage (http://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.

org/document/208946). 

26. It was founded in 1978 by Philip Agee, a former CIA agent who turned into an indefatigable critic of the 

intelligence service. 

27. The tryptic “Meet the KGB Spies Who Invented Fake News,” “The Seven Commandments of Fake News,” 

“The Worldwide War on Truth,” was published in The New York Times (12 Nov. 2018). 

595

intelligence services between 1964 and 1966 stressed that, to succeed, “every disinforma-

tion message must at least partially correspond to reality or generally accepted views.”28

• Quarto, conceal the origin of the fabrication. The information needed to appear as 

coming from somewhere not tied to the Soviet Union. 

• Quinto, identify “useful idiots” capable of relaying the message coined by Moscow. 

• Sexto, make sure the USSR was never mentionned. There was only one rule to avoid 

that: always deny any involvement. 

• Septimo, bet on the long run. All operations were not meant to bear immediate results, 

and it could seemingly require years before the effects were known. 

Arguably, this model now needs to be adapted to account for the changes that followed 

the introduction of the Internet, which the authors described as “anonymity, ubiquity, 

immediacy.” And yet, it is a particularly efficient blueprint for a nation in search of 

informational power.29

III. Chronology of the Operation “Infektion 2.0” 

Contrary to a Soviet operation that lasts several years, the Chinese operation was 

rolled out in a month in 2020, thanks to social media. Not unlike the Soviets, the 

Chinese reacted rapidly to a virus that they had not anticipated: HIV, like the Covid-19, 

are phenomenon that provided these countries’ agents with an opportunity to target their 

adversaries with disinformation. As it happens, with the coronavirus, the Russians – not 

the Chinese – were the first to react: on January 20, 2020, a TV channel funded by the 

Russian Ministry of Defense, Zvezda, was the first media to describe the virus as a U.S. 

biological weapon, during an interview with Igor Nikulin, an “expert” that often appears 

on propaganda TV channels.30 He was previously known for denying Bashar al-Assad’s use 

of chemical weapons in Syria,31 and for accusing Americans of using biological weapons 

for instance.32 Meanwhile, in China, when a resident of Inner Mongolia circulated the same 

story on the app Kuaishou six days later (a video viewed 14,000 times), he was charged with 

spreading rumors and detained for ten days.33 And yet, Chinese diplomats and media were 

spreading that same rumor a month later. In the meantime, Beijing came to understand 

that there was an opportunity following the “intense internal criticisms” that the CCP 

had to face for its management of the crisis,34 and which was taken up globally, including 

in the United States. On the defensive, the Party-State reacted by diverting the atten-

tion, accusing Washington of being responsible for the pandemic. Strictly speaking, the 

28. Ladislav Bittman, The KGB and Soviet Disinformation: An Insider’s View (Washington: Brassey’s Inc, 1985). 

29. It could be interesting to question the possible influence of the Soviet model of disinformation on American 

“covert actions.” 

30. Aleksandra Arsentieva, “Эксперт связал вспышку пневмонии в Китае с испытанием биологического 

оружия” (“An Expert Linked the Epidemy of Pneumonia in China to a Biological Weapon Tryout”), Zvezda (20 Jan. 

2020), https://archive.vn/KVmZd. 

31. For instance: “Accusé à tort? Damas ne possède plus d’armes chimiques depuis 2014” [“Wrongly Accused? 

Damascas Has no Chemical Weapons since 2014”], Sputnik (5 Apr. 2017). 

32. Weaponized: How Rumors about Covid-19’s Origins led to a Narrative Arms Race, DFRLab, Atlantic Council 

(Feb. 2021), 16-17 

33. Erika Kinetz, “Anatomy of a Conspiracy: With COVID, China Took Leading Role,” AP News (15 Feb. 2021). 

34. Ibid. 

596

operation started on February 22, with the use of a Chinese study on the transmission 

of the virus, which had been published the previous day: based on 93 complete genomes 

of the virus, the scientists defended that the virus could have been imported from a place 

other than the Huanan market, in Wuhan.35 The sequence of events then unfolded as such: 

• February 22: The Global Times (→ p. 181) published an article that evoked the con-

cerns of the Chinese government following a Japanese report, on TV Asahi, that affirmed 

that the virus could have originated in the United States.36 This article was covered by the 

People’s Daily on February 23 which, via its partners (→ p. 189), had it published abroad as 

well, including in the Helsinki Times (February 24),37 and in the New Zealand Herald (Febraury 

26).38 It contributed to the international circulation of the rumor. 

• February 27: the Chinese epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan (钟南山), who discovered 

the SARS virus in 2003, explained during a press conference that the coronavirus could 

have originated outside of China.39 

• March 4: the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs joined the fray through its deputy 

spokesperson, Zhao Lijian (→ p. 232). During a press conference, he quoted the decla-

rations made by Zhong Nanshan. 

35. Yu Wenbin, Tang Guangda, Zhang Li, and Richard T. Corlett, “Decoding Evolution and Transmissions of 

Novel Pneumonia Coronavirus Using the Whole Genomic Data,” ChinaXiv:202002.00033 (21 Feb. 2020), https://

archive.vn/cqUqj. 

36. Hu Yuwei and Zhang Han, “US CDC Refutes TV Asahi Story, Claiming No Evidence Shows Flu Deaths in US 

Were Caused by Coronavirus,” Global Times (22 Feb. 2020). 

37. https://archive.vn/lrFji.

38. The article was since deleted from its website. 

39. 韦杰夫 (Wei Jiefu) 蔡敏婕 (Cai Minjie), “钟南山谈新冠肺炎治疗热点问题: 不可能一个月内研发出

新 药” (“Zhong Nanshan Discusses the Polemical Question of the Treatment Against the Coronavirus-Induced 

Pneumonia: It Is Not Possible to Create a New Drug in a Month”), 中国新闻网 (China News Service) (27 Feb. 2020), 

https://archive.vn/g0Jji. 

597

• March 7: the Chinese embassy in South Africa took to Twitter to relay the words of the 

Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokesman on the unknown origin of the coronavirus. Without 

certainty on the origin of the virus, the ambassador added that it was not “made in China.”40

• March 12: the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokesman, Hua Chunying, repeated 

the statement of Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and 

Prevention, acknowledging in front of the House Oversight Committee of the U.S. Congress 

that several cases of the Covid-19 had mistakenly been labeled as flu. For that reason, the 

spokeswoman rejected the nickname “Chinese virus.” At about the same time, the ministry’s 

other spokesperson, Zhao Linjiang, wondered, in a tweet, about the involvement of the 

US Army, which he deemed a possible origin of the coronavirus. He instrumentalized the 

speech given by Robert Redfield; he also highlighted the presence of a US team at the 7th 

Military World Games that took place in Wuhan in October and November 2019, implying 

that the Americans could have infected the Chinese population in Wuhan.41 

40. “No Confirmed Case of COVID-19 Imported from China to Africa,” Website of the PRC Embassy in South 

Africa (17 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/rrlqe.

41. US Department of Defense, “Military World Games,” https://bit.ly/3oJDjj0. 

598

• March 13: in two successive messages, Zhao Lijian referred his Twitter followers to 

two articles published by a Larry Romanoff, on globalresearch.ca (mondialisation.ca in 

its French version), an emanation from the Center for Research on Globalization (CRG), 

a self-described independent think tank based in Montreal (→ p. 602). These two articles 

endorsed the theory of an American-made virus. During this “peak” of March 12-13, 

Zhao tweeted no less than eleven times about this topic and his messages were “cited 

over 99,000 times over the next six weeks, in at least 54 languages.”42 They were relayed 

by Chinese diplomats and media, but also “Venezuela’s foreign minister and RT’s cor-

respondent in Caracas, as well as Saudi accounts close to the kingdom’s royal family.”43

Meanwhile, the Global Times published an article explaining that the United States 

was engaged in an informational war against China to make Beijing responsible for the 

apparition of the Covid-19. The article highlighted the important number of persons 

(37,000) who had died from the flu in the U.S. in 2019, implying that some deaths might 

have been caused by the Covid-19 instead.44 

42. Kinetz, “Anatomy of a conspiracy.”

43. Ibid. 

44. These numbers are not notably high: 61,000 Americans died from the flu the previous year. See: “Estimated 

Influenza Illnesses, Medical visits, Hospitalizations, and Deaths in the United States – 2017–2018 Influenza Season,” 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, https:// www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm. 

599

An article that covered the hypothesis of an American responsibility largely circulated 

the same day on both WeChat (→ p. 196) and the Guancha website (→ p. 491).45 It 

evoked in particular the existence of a petition deposited on the dedicated website of 

the White House to demand that the U.S. government tells the truth about Fort Detrick. 

It then described a series of strange coincidences: that Fort Detrick closed in July 2019, 

a virulent flu in the United States (it never happened), a drill on fighting pandemics 

organized in the United States in October, the emergence of the coronavirus in China 

and, finally, the suppression of online videos that evoked the closing of Fort Detrick. 

Its author explained that the petition had been deleted from the website of the U.S. 

government because it had not received the necessary votes (100,000) in 30 days to 

be kept online. Furthermore, the article mentioned the evidence uncovered by Larry 

Romanoff but seemed to lean toward the hypothesis of an accidental infection through 

U.S. sportspersons present in Wuhan in October and November 2019. 

• March 19; the Chinese national TV channel CGTN (→ p. 176) published an article 

untitled “10 questions for the U.S.: Where did the novel coronavirus come from?”46 

in which the author, Wang Fuhua, highlighted the very bad performance of the U.S. 

delegation during the games in Wuhan – which had to be hiding something. Was the 

delegation carrying the virus? Another question raised suspicion: Wang Fuhua recalled 

that the United States had conveniently organized a crisis management drill on a pan-

demic in October 2019, apparently attended by the CIA director. Only one month 

45. Circulated on Guancha by a Jin Wei (金微) (https://archive.vn/UDRJE) and on WeChat by “Kekekankan” 

(可可看看) (https://archive.vn/JUwym). 

46. Wang Fuhua, “10 Questions for the U.S.: Where Did the Novel Coronavirus Come From?” CGTN (19 Mar. 

2020), https://archive.vn/fHcky. 

600

N

before the pandemic started in China; for the author, it could not have been a mere 

coincidence. This is a classical method, even a topos, of conspiracy theories, along with 

pseudo-comparatist efforts: an historical analogy gives the illusion of analytical rigor. 

For instance, the Spanish flu emerged in the United States but Washington let Spain 

bear the responsibility for the pandemic, and it was allegedly doing the same today 

with China today. 

• March 20: The People Daily (Renmin ribao) published an article by Zhong Sheng47 

that quoted Daniel Lucey, an expert on infectious diseases at Georgetown University, 

in Washington, who wrote that the first case of coronavirus probably occurred in 

November 2019 or earlier.48 Hence, this official newspaper highlighted the uncertainty 

around the origin of the virus, which should have encouraged Americans to be more 

cautious. 

• March 22: CGTN quoted an Italian doctor interviewed by the U.S. radio NPR who 

explained that cases of Covid-19 were present in Italy as early as December, perhaps 

even November, before the pandemic was known in China. 

• March 22: the same day, the Chinese ambassador to the United States, Cui Tiankai 

(崔天 凯) declared in an interview that the conspiracy theories that evoked a possible 

fabrication of the virus by the U.S. Army were “crazy.”49 On February 9, he had said the 

same thing on the TV show “Face the Nation” on CBS.50

47. This pen name had been used by the People’s Daily since November 2008 to write about Chinese positions on 

international issues. Zhong Sheng (钟声) means “the ringing of a bell,” the shortened version of 警世钟声 (jingshi 

zhongsheng) which can be translated as “the bell rings to alert the world.” The journalists from the People’s Daily thus 

play on a homophony because 钟 and 中 (“China”) have the same pronunciation, and 声 also carries the meaning of 

“voice.” As such, Zhong Sheng can also be translated as “the voice of China” (https://archive.vn/p0DIv). 

48. Zhong Sheng (钟声), “必须抵御污名化之毒” (“We Need to Resist Stigmatization”), Renmin ribao (20 Mar. 

2020), https://archive.vn/LG7vo. 

49. Jonathan Swan and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “Top Chinese Official Disowns U.S. Military Lab Coronavirus 

Conspiracy,” Axios, (22 Mar. 2020). 

50. “Transcript: Ambassador Cui Tiankai on “Face the Nation,” February 9, 2020,” CBS News (9 Feb. 2020). 

601

• March 23: Zhao Lijian published a message on his Twitter account that sharply con-

trasted with the tone of the previous days. 

After this date, the narrative of a U.S involvement in the creation of the Covid-

19 became less prominently relayed – although it did not disappear. The Chinese 

Communist Party then adopted a new narrative that presented China as the country that 

managed to fight the virus efficiently. It encouraged others to adopt the same methods, 

while several voices stressed that the nature of the regime was intimately linked to China’s 

success in managing the sanitary crisis. 

Hitherto, the narrative portraying the United States as responsible for the emer-

gence of the Covid-19 – either as a voluntary aggression or as an involuntary acci-

dent – circulated rapidly in Chinese diasporas, especially in France and Italy, where the 

theories have been abundantly relayed. Two ideas seemed to be recurring: the virus was 

presented as a revenge for the discriminations and racism to which the Chinese were sub-

jected at the start of the pandemic; and the fact that an American origin of the virus made 

it easier to explain why the virus kept circulating elsewhere, in France and Italy especially, 

when China was able to control its circulation. 

This is probably the reason why the narrative of a U.S. virus was essentially cir-

culating on WeChat. A WeChat account managed by journalists from the Global Times 

continued to defend the conspiracy theory that the coronavirus may have escaped from a 

laboratory of the U.S. Army in Fort Detrick. One article covered the history of the labo-

ratory and suggested that it was both highly secretive in its research on biological weapons 

and badly regulated.51 Besides, the articles posted on WeChat were also very critical of the 

U.S. system. Xiakedao (侠客岛), the WeChat account of the Renmin Ribao – whom we 

mentioned previously – affirmed that a third of the Covid-19-related deaths in the United 

States occurred in retirement homes, calling it a “massacre approved by the government” (a 

similar accusation was also formulated by the Chinese ambassador to France, as we noted 

in part three → p. 235).52 As for CCTV’s account, it declared that the United States had 

51. Posted by 补壹刀 (Buyidao), Wechat user “buyidao2016,” “这个神秘的美军P4生物实验室，黑历史多到

爆” (“The Darl History of the Mysterious Biological Lab P4 of the US Army”), Wechat (14 May 2020), https://archive.

vn/QBHuv.

52. Result of Weibo Search with the text “#美国死亡病例1/3来自养老院#” (“A Third of the Patients Who 

Died in the United States Were in Retirement Houses”) (3 Feb. 2021), https://archive.vn/5vGIz. 

602

reduced the budget of the CDC, which explained the Americans’ inability to deal with the 

virus. It also inferred that a plot might have explained so much inertia.53

IV. An Analysis of the “Infektion 2.0” Operation 

Several aspects and details of this operation deserve to be analyzed. First of all, it is 

necessary to return to what constituted the core of Zhao Lijian’s argumentation, in other 

words the two articles published by Larry Romanoff.54 We then evaluate the motiva-

tions behind the operation and its effectiveness.

A. The CRG

In the two tweets he published on March 13, Zhao Lijian encouraged his readers to visit 

the website of globalreasearch.ca (CRG) to read the articles published by Larry Romanoff. 

The CRG was created in 2001 by a Canadian, Michel Chossudovsky, a professor at the 

University of Ottawa close to Thierry Meyssan and a regular guest on the Russian channel 

RT.55 The CRG is famous for its active role in the “conspirasphere” (its articles are, 

for example, taken up on Le Grand Soir, a militant newspaper of “alternative information” 

administered by Maxime Vivas, mentioned in the previous part → p. 335) and as a relay 

of Russian campaigns of disinformation. In fact, its activities have drawn the attention of 

NATO.56 CRG’s English website is visited by a million visitors each month (1.59 million in 

February 2020) and the French version by more than 100,000 visitors (113,000 in February 

2020).57 Its articles adopy the method used by some Russian media outlets: instrumental-

izing and hijacking neutral voices and serious outlets to deliver a message that reinforces 

their own narrative. 

One of the two articles written by Larry Romanoff relied on a report presumably pub-

lished by Asahi TV in Japan. It also quoted Shen Yi (沈逸), a professor of international 

relations at Fudan University, in Shanghai and, more importantly, a Taiwanese virologist 

that intervened in Zhe ! Bushi xinwen (這! 不是新聞)58 (This! This is not information), a TV 

show aired on the Taiwanese channel EBC Dongsen Financial News (東森財經新聞台), an 

emanation of the Eastern Broadcasting Company (東森電視), formerly known as Eastern 

Television (ETTV).59

Using three different sources, including two that were not expected to be partial because 

coming from “adversaries” of China (a Taiwanese virologist and a Japanese TV show), Larry 

Romanoff hoped to bring some objective veneer to his words. In reality, it was only an illu-

sion. First, no link to the Japanese TV show was given; only to an article of the Chinese Global 

53. Posted by 玉渊谭天 (Yuyuantantian), on Weibo (14 May 2020), https://archive.vn/7A0JX. 

54. Since deleted, but archived: Larry Romanoff, “China’s Coronavirus: A Shocking Update. Did the Virus 

Originate in the US?” Global Research (4 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/2LJR0; “COVID-19: Further Evidence that the 

virus Originated in the US,” Global Research (11 Mar. 2020), https://archive.vn/fJYZw. 

55. See the Conspiracy Watch webpage dedicated to Mondialisation.ca: https://www.conspiracywatch.info/ 

mondialisation-ca. 

56. Nathan Vanderklippe, “Chinese Official Promoting Unfounded Canadian Theory that Coronavirus Has Roots 

in U.S. Military,” The Globe and Mail, (14 Mar. 2020). 

57. Data provided by “SimilarWeb.” 

58. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvdCKimJzeQ.

59. The show was largely circulated on WeChat and other platforms. 

603

Times mentioning the Japanese program. In fact, Romanoff simply quoted the Global Times, 

not the Japanese report. Then, without assessing the argumentation of the Taiwanese virol-

ogist – who used a set of scientific tools to show that the virus could only have come from 

the United States because the largest number of variants of the virus was in that country – it 

should be noted that ETTV was already known for its pro-Guomindang (KMT) and pro-Bei-

jing positions. As for Shen Yi, his words (which are quoted without a verifiable source) simply 

reasserted that China kept wondering about the primary origin of the virus. In conclusion, the 

evidence shown by Larry Romanoff was weak and certainly not as neutral as he said. 

B. Larry Romanoff

The author of the articles, Larry Romanoff, introduced himself as a former consultant 

and current professor at Fudan University, in Shanghai, the city where he supposedly lives. 

He mentioned only one way to contact him: an email address on the Chinese messaging 

service QQ (2186604556@qq.com). His first article was published on globalresearch.ca on 

September 24, 2019, in which he described the Tian’anmen events as a U.S. attempt at pro-

moting a color revolution in China. He wrote 72 articles in six months, all tainted with 

conspiracy theory, and, after late January 2020, almost all of them dealt with the coro-

navirus. Even though they are not academic articles, this was still an important activity. 

Investigating Larry Romanoff ’s background provided few results. Matthew Brown, jour-

nalist at USA Today, tried to contact Romanoff to obtain more details on some elements 

mentioned in his articles, but without success.60 Larry Romanoff could not be reached. 

Moreover, there is no recent photo of him. The Russian Pravda, which published six of 

his articles between January 9 and March 9, 2021, illustrated his biography with a photo… 

of Ernest Hemingway.61

This biography simply copied the way he presents himself on his websites “The Moon 

of Shanghai (上海的月亮) – moonofshanghai.com (created in April 202062) and bluemoo-

nofshanghai.com (in October 202063) – but without any picture of him there as well. We 

could not find videos either. A sole audio recording was posted online in April 2020.64

The Chinese-speaking Internet describes Larry Romanoff (拉里·罗曼诺夫) as an 

“all-powerful” professor (万能65) or as a “world-famous scientist” (世界著名科学家66) 

60. Mathhew Brown, “Fact Check: Coronavirus Originated in China, Not Elsewhere, Researchers and Studies Say,” 

USA Today (16 Mar. 2020). 

61. https://archive.vn/KgcS7. 

62. https://archive.vn/nguZl

63. https://archive.vn/ZIuBn

64. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKVnIxQzfvs

65. https://archive.vn/97xDk.

66. https://archive.vn/ANw3n.

604

who is presumably a visiting professor at Fudan University, teaching in the MBA 

– despite the lack of mention of his name on the English and Chinese versions of 

the website of the prestigious Shanghai university. The managers of the MBA pro-

gram interviewed by the Wall Street Journal confirmed not knowing him, either as “Larry 

Romanoff,”67 or under his presumed LinkedIn pseudonym, “Larry Long,” a “visiting 

professor” at Fudan University, trained at the University of Calgary, and now teaching in 

the former’s MBA program.68

Nonetheless, this fake profile gives some interesting information since it lists bearcanada.com 

as its personal site, which is no longer online but whose archives show that it had three distinct 

lives.69 During the first one, between 2000 and 2005, bearcanada.com was the website of 

Treasures of the Orient Inc, a Calgary-based company, North American representative 

of Bear Productions, a Hong Kong-based company producing music for a children’s choir (the 

Bear Children’s Choir of Hong Kong), and an importer of Asian products:

Screenshot of the bearcanada.com contact page on November 29, 2004

67. James T. Areddy, “Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory Claims It Began in the U.S. – and Beijing Is Buying It,” The 

Wall Street Journal (26 Mar. 2020). 

68. https://www.linkedin.com/in/larry-long-a090b9a/ (https://archive.ph/PWTja). 

69. https://web.archive.org/web/changes/http://bearcanada.com/. 

605

Before it changed address in July/August 2001, the company’s address was:70

Twenty years later, the phone number still appeared on the Hong Kong website of the 

children’s choir.71 As for the fax number, in Canadian reverse directories it appears as a 

telephone number assigned to “Larry Romanoff,” who was indeed domiciled at this 

address.72

And indeed, Romanoff was at the time the owner of this company, as confirmed 

by a photo published in the Calgary Herald in 2001, because of a news item (Canada 

Post sent him by mistake an invoice of more than $140 million73). Larry Romanoff was 

introduced as an entrepreneur with a business importing music and toys for children from 

China. The article is illustrated by a picture of him, taken in July 2001, which reveals the 

name and address of his company, which correspond to the one of the bearcanada.com 

website.

Picture of Larry Romanoff published in the Calgary Herald in July 2001 (©David Moll/Calgary Herald).

At that time, Romanoff was importing Chinese music. The manager of the Bear Children’s 

Choir in Hong Kong, from whom he ordered 100 CDs for resale in North America, found 

“a little weird” that “some Canadian guy only speaking English [sold] Cantonese music.”74 

70. A change of address occurred between July and August 2001, the new address being “Suite 304, 110 - 2nd Ave. 

S. E., Calgary, AB, Canada T2G 0B3.” The rest remained unchanged.

71. https://archive.vn/zZTwy. 

72. https://www.telephoneinverse.com/directory/lookup-403-237. See also: https://www.locatefamily.com/

Street-Lists/Canada/AB/T2P/T2P0E7/index.html.

73. Two bills for $70.8 million and $71.3 million, instead of the $103 he owed. Calgary Herald (13 Jul. 2001), B2.

74. Areddy, “Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory.” 

606

In 2002, Romanoff transferred parts of his business on another website, an online market-

place hosted at members.shaw.ca/toyscanada/toymain.html.75

One can assume, as the Wall Street Journal does, that this “Larry” Romanoff of 2001 is 

the “Lawrence Delvin” Romanoff who left another trail in the same Calgary Herald three 

years earlier. A 1998 article reported that he was arrested in 1995 for trafficking in used 

stamps that he cleaned and resold for new.76 At his trial three years later, he pleaded guilty 

but also good faith, explaining that he had tried to raise funds for his church, and produc-

ing a letter of thanks that Mother Teresa had personally sent him in April 1995. The article 

presented him as 55 years old and owner of a small advertising agency.

If this is indeed the same person (who would therefore be 58 years old in the photo 

above), it would mean that he quickly reoriented his carrer after his 1998 trial, since his 

company Treasures of the Orient Inc. was created the following year. The Alberta Business 

Registry indicates that Treasures of the Orient Inc. was registered in September 1999 

and deregistered in 2005.77

And for good reason, in 2005 the home page of bearcanada.com indicated a move 

from Calgary to Shanghai:

Screenshot from the bearcanada.com website, on November 26, 2005.78

His departure was confirmed by a readers’ letter published by The Economist in July 2005 

in which Larry Romanoff signed a letter from Calgary.79 In 2008, in another letter mailed 

to the Globe and Mail this time, he presented himself as “businessman living in Shanghai” 

critical of the Chinese policy of the Prime Minister Stephen Harper.80

Thus began the second life of bearcanada.com, which was a transitional phase: between 

2006 and 2009, the site was essentially an empty shell, with only the home page changed. 

It presented a “Canadian business, staffed by Canadians, and resident in Shanghai” that 

offered “a variety of products manufactured in China”.

75. https://web.archive.org/web/20021220081932/http://www.members.shaw.ca/toyscanada/toymain.html.

76. “Used stamp sales admitted,” Calgary Herald (22 Jan. 1998), B5.

77. https://albertacorporations.com/treasures-of-the-orient-inc. 

78. https://web.archive.org/web/20051126062205/http://bearcanada.com/.

79. In which he explained having sold his house in Calgary in 1984 for CA$131,000 (Letters, The Economist (7 Jul. 

2005)).

80. “Canada has missed the boat on the miracle of China’s development. I believe Stephen Harper’s foreign policy 

is thoughtless and short-sighted, subject to a right-wing blindness for which all Canadians will pay dearly” (Larry 

Romanoff, “As China’s friend, we’re history,” The Globe and Mail (28 May 2008), A16).

607

Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com on October 12, 2006.81

It is the third life of the site that is the most interesting as far as we are concerned, because 

it is the one that reveals the Larry Romanoff we know today. In 2010, bearcanada.com, 

completely redesigned, became an anti-American and pro-Chinese conspiracy site.

Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com on October 12, 2011.82

81. https://web.archive.org/web/20061012014843/http://www.bearcanada.com:80/.

82. https://web.archive.org/web/20111103223650/http://www.bearcanada.com/index.html.

608

The site is also particularly anti-Semitic, with a dedicated section containing numer-

ous articles and unambiguous visuals:

Screenshot from the website bearcanada.com/fae/fae.html on July 12, 2012.83

The articles were signed 龙信明, which literally means “Larry Romanoff,” as did the 

header where the same name was indicated on the left. In a section entitled “Shanghai 

Diary,” the author published photos and comments from his walks around the city. Several 

remarks (about missing Canadian lobsters, comparing climates or prices between Shanghai 

and Calgary, his nephew Eddie in Canada, his return to Canada for Christmas, etc.) leave 

little doubt that the author was indeed Larry Romanoff, the Canadian from Calgary. He 

published a very large number of articles, on a wide variety of subjects. This version of 

the site was active between 2010 and 2013: publications were less frequent in 2013, the 

site stopped evolving from July 2013 and disappeared between May and December 

2014. It has since been offline.

In 2012-2013, several “alternative” news sites reposted its articles, including 4thme-

dia.org, the English version of the “April Internet” website we mentioned in Part II due 

its links to the CYL (→ p. 77). One of the most shared articles is a rewriting of the events 

of Tian’anmen, which would not at all have happened as the “Western” media described 

it.84 These articles are signed “doctor” or “professor Long Xinming of Fudan University,” 

presented as the founder and author of the website bearcanada.com.85 Long Xinming, 龙

信明 in Chinese, is the alias that Larry Romanoff admitted using. He also signed 

“Larry Romanoff (龙信明)” in 2010 and in 2020.86 The LinkedIn page we mentioned 

earlier is actually a mix of the two names (“Larry Long”). The equivalence Larry Romanoff 

= Long Xinming (龙信明) = founder and author of boardcanada.com is therefore 

indisputable. 

In addition, the link between the third version of boardcanada.com (2010-2014) 

and Larry Romanoff ’s current sites, moonofshanghai.com and bluemoonofshang-

hai.com (since 2020), is also established since we find on both his current websites the 

banner that appeared previously on boardcanada.com:

On the left, header of boardcanada.com (2010-2014); on the right, extract of moonofshanghai.com 

and bluemoonofshanghai.com (since 2020).

83. https://web.archive.org/web/20120712073754/http://www.bearcanada.com/fae/fae.html.

84. https://archive.ph/5GwUd (original publication on bearcanada.com: https://archive.ph/eZ8tY).

85. See for instance: https://archive.vn/QATd9; https://archive.vn/zNAIw; https://archive.vn/DaLSL; https://

archive.ph/5GwUd.

86. https://archive.vn/tb5tl and https://archive.vn/nguZl. 

609

Romanoff did not appear to have used this alias after 2013. Moreover, when Ramesh 

Thakur, former UN Under Secretary General and Vice-Rector of the UN University, revis-

ited in 2019 the site on which “Long Xinming’s” article on Tian’anmen was published in 

2013, he found that ”the author’s name had changed to Bhaiaidil Fiverr, which might 

raise questions about authenticity”.87 The site in question is since inaccessible, and Bhaiaidil 

Fiverr is a unique name, which is not used anywhere else. 

Between 2010 and 2012, Romanoff was also one of the contributors to the collective 

blog Hidden Harmonies, created in February 2010, on which he reposted some of his 

articles. Note that his biographical presentation did not change between 2010 and 2021.

Source : https://archive.vn/tb5tl.

He did not contribute to Hidden Harmonies for seven years, then came back in March 

2020.88 He was listed as a contributor again, and re-published one of the two articles on 

the coronavirus originally published on GlobalResearch.ca and relayed by Zhao Lijian on 

March 13.89

In conclusion, while a quick analysis of Larry Romanoff ’s latest publications 

(2019-2020) could legitimately lead to the belief that he was “probably a fake blog-

ger created from scratch by the Chinese to echo their messages,” all of the above 

makes this hypothesis less credible as the means deployed to create Romanoff ’s “leg-

end” would be disproportionate to the expected gain.90 Most likely, Larry Romanoff 

exists and is a “useful idiot,” perhaps influenced and mentored by the Party-State. 

However, several elements in his trajectory remain to be clarified: his initial links 

with China (how does a Canadian from Calgary become the North American represen-

tative of a choir of Hong Kong children?); his anti-American and anti-Semitic conspir-

acy theories that suddenly emerged in 2010 (had he been developing them for a longer 

period?); and the “gap” of about six years, between 2013 (the end of bearcanada.com) 

and 2019 (his debut on GlobalResearch.ca), during which this already prolific author 

seemed to have stopped publishing, at least under his own name as well as under his alias 

Long Xinming (why?).

87. Ramesh Thakur, “Which Tian’anmen narrative is true?,” The Japan Times (6 Jun. 2019).

88. In fact, he was no longer listed as a contributor in this capture of a June 2015 presentation: https://archive.

ph/R32Tk.

89. https://archive.vn/fGFIF and https://archive.vn/Clsmv.

90. Antoine Bondaz, quoted in Vincent Nouzille, “La grande offensive des espions chinois,” Le Figaro Magazine (17 

Jul. 2020), 42. In the unpublished IRSEM note of April 2020, we ourselves envisaged that Larry Romanoff could be a 

front name, a virtual agent, behind which hides an agency of the Party-State apparatus, or a non-state actor in its pay, 

which would imply relatively important means of coordination (Charon, L’opération “Covid-19”).

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C. The motivations behind the operation

There is no lack of possible motives to explain the CCP’s decision to launch such an 

operation, and they were mentioned all through this report: creating a diversion for the 

Chinese population toward an evident scapegoat; offering an indirect contribution 

to the perennity of the regime; or an easier switch to the narrative presenting China 

as benevolent by concentrating attacks on the United States. It might also have 

been an attempt at weakening the democratic model of government with the narra-

tive on the “good” sanitary governance, and even with the efficient Chinese model of crisis 

management that was used in targeting the public of “soft targets” (Italy, Spain, Serbia…), 

with important mediatic resources. The operation could also be partly explained by the 

weakening belief among the party’s leadership that China needs to maintain good relations 

with the United States.

This operation could also be understood as a Chinese retaliation, or a warning 

sent to the United States, following a series of particularly offensive decisions taken by 

Washington in February: on the 10th, four Chinese soldiers from the 54th research institute 

were criminally charged for the 2017 Equifax hack (image below);91 Huawei was charged 

with extorsion on the 13th;92 and Washington decided to label Chinese state media as CCP 

agents on the 17th.93 It is however impossible to confirm that hypothesis with the informa-

tion at our disposal at the moment, but the proximity of the events deserved to be noted. 

Now, we need to explain the reasons behind the end of the operation “Infektion 2.0.,” 

or at least behind its reduced intensity. Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian interpreted it as a sign 

of the adoption of Russian methods by China.94 With such an interpretation, Cui Tiankai’s 

declarations would thus be motivated by the will to spread contradictory slogans to confuse 

the enemy. But it might also have been done to appease the United States – which is all the 

more possible as the CCP could leave the fake information circulating unattended, 

finding its own relays in the conspiracy spheres in Europe and in the United States, or in 

Chinese diasporas. 

91. Brian Barrett, “How 4 Chinese Hackers Allegedly Took Down Equifax,” WIRED (10 Feb. 2020); see also: FBI, 

“Chinese PLA Members, 54th Research Institute,” https://bit.ly/3aAvmb0. 

92. “Chinese Telecommunications Conglomerate Huawei and Subsidiaries Charged in Racketeering Conspiracy 

and Conspiracy to Steal Trade Secrets,” The US Department of Justice (13 Feb. 2020). 

93. Lara Jakes and Steven Lee Myers, “U.S. Designates China’s Official Media as Operatives of the Communist 

State,” The New York Times (18 Feb. 2020). 

94. Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “China Takes a Page from Russia’s Disinformation Playbook,” Axios (25 Mar. 

2020). 

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D. The Operation’s efficiency

It is too early to evaluate the efficacity of an operation the consequences of which may 

be felt over a few years and through unexpected channels. The future will tell us how the 

belief in an American origin of the coronavirus settled in the minds. At the moment, the 

Chinese narrative has seldom been reused, which could be a sign of resistance in the tar-

geted societies, except perhaps in Chinese diasporas. That said, the operation undeniably 

contributes to the fragilization of democratic societies by insidiously questioning the 

nature of their institutions and by attacking the very possibility of truth, which is the key 

to consent in liberal societies. 

V. An Undeniable Russification of Chinese methods

For the authors, this operation is interesting because it confirms the Russification/

sovietization of Chinese methods of disinformation. To illustrate this evolution, we 

can simply bring back the seven steps identified earlier by the authors of The New York 

Times’s article: (→ p. 594): 

• Primo, China, like the USSR before, promptly reacted and saw an opportunity for 

concealed disinformation in the Covid-19.

• Secundo, there again, the Soviet method was precisely respected. The idea of a virus 

created by the U.S. Army and implanted in Wuhan through the World Military Games is 

so difficult to conceive that it could only be true. 

• Tertio, the Chinese lie was built on enough truthful elements to make it credible: the 

speech delivered by Robert Redfield on earlier cases of Covid-19, the near coincidence 

between the games in Wuhan and the epidemic, the U.S. drill on a similar scenario a 

month before the epidemic, the uncertainty over the exact origin of the virus and on 

its initial transmission by animals, the historical analogy with the Spanish flu. All these 

elements reinforced the plausibility of the Chinese narrative. 

• Quarto, the Chinese hand was largely hidden, at least without a thorough investiga-

tion. Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs relayed elements made public by 

third-party actors. The Party never directly advanced new arguments, and simply relayed 

them – such as the Soviets did. Larry Romanoff could be perceived as a neutral actor. 

• Quinto, useful idiots were legions: the Taiwanese virologist was one of them, as were 

Michel Chossudovsky and Larry Romanoff. The WHO could be listed as well as it kept 

defending the Chinese version against all odds. 

• Sexto, like the Soviets, China denied any involvement. When the narrative changed, 

after the intervention of Cui Tiankai on U.S. TV, the Chinese government evoked demo-

cratic processes internal to the party to explain the diverging opinions among diplomats. 

Yet, all this could be seen as a pure construction because the implementation of the 

operation by Zhao Lijian, a mere diplomat, gave an opportunity for the party to present 

his declarations as an isolated and unofficial position. But it is unimaginable that the 

Party left a high-ranking diplomat say such things, for several weeks, without making its 

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disapproval known. Hence, the narrative advertised by Zhao was validated by Chinese 

authorities. 

• Septimo, this is where China seemed to have kept its distance from the “ideal type” 

of the Soviet operation. The Chinese campaign ended too quickly and without enough 

time to assess its reach. It is also impossible to tell what the hopes of the regime were: 

briefly diverting the Chinese public by weakening an adversary? Forcefully inscribing the 

possible American creation of the virus in the minds? Or was it a more “experimental” 

approach to an operation, one that could pave the way for more complex disinformation 

activities in the future? 

Similarly to the Soviets, the Chinese have an integrated vision of political warfare: “active 

measures” are routine methods used by the CCP that involve numerous and diverse actors. 

But the exact level of coordination between these actors remains a question mark. 

Did diplomats act on their own initiative? It seems improbable. The articles published 

during the operation also suggested a common action with the propaganda arms of the 

Party. 

Finally, we found that the coronavirus did not simply lead to the implementation of a 

Chinese influence operation modeled on the Russian and Soviet operations, but also to 

concurring actions that named the United States as the source of the virus. For instance, 

an article published by RT highjacked the words of Wilbur Ross, the U.S. Secretary of 

Commerce, to increase the perception that the United States had an economic interest in 

seeing the virus circulate.95 For that reason, the Russian narrative was easily inscribed in 

the Chinese narrative and it provided the latter with a breath of fresh air by bringing 

it to a larger public. In fact, a possible cooperation between Russian and Chinese actors 

is one of the questions to which the conclusion of the present report will try to answer. 

95. “Feast in Time of Plague? Trump Official Says China Coronavirus is Good for US Economy,” RT (31 Jan. 

2020), https://archive.vn/nXgbo. 

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