Sunny Chao | Epoch Times
In a three-day operation this week, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers arrested 33 fugitives who committed human rights crimes, among them four Chinese nationals who helped or conducted forced abortions and sterilizations in China.
ICE said in its public notice that Operation No Safe Haven IV began on April 16, resulting in the arrests of 33 foreign fugitives, among whom eight were criminals convicted in the United States of battery, weapons offenses, driving while intoxicated, resisting arrest, among others. All of them have outstanding removal orders and are subject to repatriation to their homelands.
The nationwide operation was carried out via the ICE field offices of Atlanta; Baltimore; Boston; Chicago; Denver; Detroit; Houston; Los Angeles; Miami; New Orleans; New York City; Philadelphia; Phoenix; Seattle; San Francisco; and St. Paul, Minnesota.
Some of the four Chinese fugitives were hospital staff, according to the ICE notice.
As a population control measure, China had strictly enforced a one-child policy for decades, beginning in the 1970s. Pregnant women lacking birth permits to have additional children were hunted down by Chinese authorities and had their baby fetuses forcibly aborted. The Chinese Communist regime claims the policy has prevented 400 million births from 1979 to 2011.
The policy has resulted in a severe gender imbalance in China, with 115.4 boys to 100 girls.
In 2015, the Chinese regime announced it would end the one-child policy and allow couples to request with government authorities to have two children.
“This operation continues ICE’s work to ensure that the United States does not serve as a safe haven for those who commit human rights violations in their countries of origin,” said Thomas D. Homan, Deputy Director of ICE. “We will continue to pursue these individuals as priorities for enforcement—using our agency’s unique authorities to investigate criminal activity and to enforce immigration laws.”
Since 2003, ICE has arrested more than 395 human rights violators under criminal or immigration statutes, and has repatriated 835 known or suspected human rights violators to their countries of origin. ICE also assisted in removing an additional 112 such fugitives from the United States.