Commentary
The Chinese regime has taken it as a pro forma exercise to yell loudly about how failure to cooperate with it creates “safe havens” for criminals in whatever country refuses to sign an extradition treaty or otherwise fails to cooperate with China in “law enforcement.”
Based on how successful Beijing has been in pursuing such cooperation and agreements, it is seemingly a strong argument for it, with few Western politicians wanting to appear “soft on crime.”
With that in mind, China’s retaliation against the United States for Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan is incredibly interesting. Beyond expanded military drills around Taiwan, the main response has been the suspension or termination of cooperation in eight areas. Of those, three issues concern law enforcement cooperation. Cooperation with the United States was limited to start with. Still, the suspension of these three areas of cooperation—repatriation of illegal immigrants, legal assistance in criminal matters, and cooperation against transnational crimes—is at a standstill. Furthermore, cooperation against the narcotics trade was also suspended….