Chinese Citizens Told to Surrender Passports
Udumbara
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Some local authorities in China have tightened control of Chinese citizens’ foreign travel, including by confiscating their passports, Chinese residents told The Epoch Times.
According to multiple residents of China’s southwest Guizhou province, Police officers or officials from subdistrict offices demanded “temporary” custody of residents’ passports, without citing the legal basis or clarifying when the documents would be returned.
“If you booked an international flight, the police would call to ask questions about the purpose of your travel,” he said.
Liu Xiaonan, a resident of Zunyi, Guizhou, said locals who frequently traveled to the United States, Europe, or Japan have recently been told to surrender their passports.
“Upon their return to China, they were also summoned by local police officers to make statements on what they were doing abroad,” Liu said.
“A friend said they had submitted their passport. To make future travels, they have to first apply to the subdistrict office,” Liu said. “Employees of the subdistrict office had their passports confiscated last year.”
The Epoch Times found similar cases in the southwestern Yunnan province.
Under Chinese law, only law enforcement or national security agencies can detain a passport, and only if the passport holder is involved in an investigation.
A lawyer from Wuhan, China, who identified himself only as Zhang for safety reasons, told The Epoch Times that the detention of passports is a restriction of citizens’ freedom of movement.
“The law stipulates that citizens enjoy freedom of entering and exiting the country,” Zhang said. “If the requirement to surrender passports is not targeted at specific individuals involved in a legal case, but is applied to ordinary residents in a general manner, there must be a clear legal basis, applicable conditions, and procedures. Otherwise, it can easily lead to disputes over its legality.”
“All Chinese officials know they don’t have the authority to do this, so no one dares to issue official documents publicly, let alone enact laws. They operate on a tacit understanding, sometimes communicating verbally, sometimes through a phone call or a simple instruction, and their subordinates simply follow orders,” he said.
