Plain-Faced L.A. Consulate Is No Ordinary Installation

Through a tightly controlled and effective public relations campaign, the Chinese Consulate in Los Angeles has helped Beijing build its political and economic power base over the past decade, here in its most strategically important American region.

In their high-stakes propaganda war with Taiwan, Chinese officials have painstakingly cultivated alliances through personal and business relationships while forging strong ties to hundreds of organizations in a burgeoning ethnic Chinese community, according to records and interviews.

The consulate, which opened in 1988 despite the FBI’s objections that it would provide opportunities for intelligence-gathering, is housed in a plain-faced office building in the Mid-Wilshire district.

But it is no ordinary diplomatic installation. Consul General Feng Shusen is said to be a friend of Premier Li Peng, and sources say he carries the rank of ambassador, indicating the consulate’s elevated status.

As a satellite of the Beijing government, the consulate performs mundane tasks such as issuing visas and promoting educational and cultural exchanges. But it also promotes trade and facilitates opportunities for a growing number of local enterprises with ties to China or Chinese ownership.

The consulate’s activities have fueled allegations that Beijing is trying to exercise too much control over Chinese nationals who are visiting or living in the United States. In addition, U.S. intelligence reports have implicated consulates in Los Angeles and elsewhere in alleged attempts by the mainland to influence U.S. political campaigns last year.

This weekend, the consulate is again in the spotlight as Chinese President Jiang Zemin--the focus of political and human rights protesters--winds up his official U.S. visit in Los Angeles.

Consulate officials did not respond to The Times’ requests for an interview.

But Katrina Leung, president of the Los Angeles-Guangzhou Sister City Assn., said the consulate’s activities foster friendship between the U.S. and China and encourage commerce that is valuable to both countries.

Leung, who is organizing a dinner for Jiang at the Regal Biltmore Hotel today, said China and some of its friends in the U.S. have been unfairly accused of trying to subvert the American election process through questionable contributions.

“I truly believe that the consulate and all parties [implicated] are innocent,” said Leung, an Ivy League-educated venture capitalist based in the San Gabriel Valley. “Nobody has come up with hard facts. Isn’t it customary in our legal practice that one is considered innocent until proven otherwise?”

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A small but loyal group of Beijing allies helped the consulate build a base of support by reaching out to newer arrivals in the community, especially those from Southeast Asia who did not fit into Chinatown’s established social structure.

One of the inner-circle members is Leung, a dynamic Republican known to have friends and family connections in the highest echelons of Beijing government.

Leung--fluent in English, Mandarin and Cantonese--has arranged events for the consulate, including one in March for 1,000 guests when the Chinese navy made its first U.S. visit.

In February, when Chinese “paramount leader” Deng Xiaoping died, Leung was at the consulate greeting dignitaries who had come to pay their respects.

But Leung also moves with ease in the mainstream political world. She has opened her spacious San Marino home for local political fund-raisers and has facilitated visits to China by the mayor and others.

“When you need to get something done with China, you go to Katrina Leung,” said one high-ranking Los Angeles city official.

Another prominent ally is Ted Sioeng, an Indonesian businessman who federal investigators believe was a political operative for China in the United States. Sioeng, whose family contributed $250,000 to the Democratic National Committee in 1996, left the country earlier this year after his name surfaced in the fund-raising scandal. His attorneys have denied any wrongdoing by Sioeng.

Based on the interception of communications from Beijing, consulates across the country were suspected of funneling $2 million into political campaigns last year. But The Times reported recently that investigators have been unable to trace contributions back to the mainland.

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Sioeng--who holds the lucrative rights to sell China’s best-selling cigarette overseas--has known Feng for many years, acquaintances say. They met in the Yunnan tobacco-growing region where Feng was a local official and Sioeng manufactured cigarettes.

Their friendship continued in the United States, where Sioeng had become such an influential figure in the Chinese emigre community that there was speculation that he helped Feng get his post nearly two years ago.

Sioeng has appeared frequently with consulate officials at public events, and he helped form and bankroll an alliance of more than 100 organizations based on hometown and professional affiliations, according to friends of Sioeng.

The Alliance of Chinese American Groups in the U.S.A. has provided numerous opportunities for consulate officials to mingle with the community and local politicians. It is run by Kent La, whose company distributes Sioeng’s Red Pagoda Mountain cigarettes.

In the battle for public relations supremacy, the Chinese-language media play a major role.

Rosemead restaurateur Faye Lee is president of Panda TV, which for two hours a day broadcasts news and cultural programs from China on cable television. Lee, who operates a restaurant in a joint venture with China, says her television business is not a front for China.

“I don’t feel like I am pro-China or pro-anybody,” she said. “As a Chinese American, I want to be a bridge in fostering understanding between China and the United States.”

The Sioeng family owns the pro-Beijing International Daily News, which is based in Monterey Park and distributed in major U.S. cities that have large Chinese populations. The newspaper tends to devote much of its coverage to China and events attended by consulate officials and pro-China groups but little to Taiwan.

Community watchers say there is no independent Chinese-language press here because newspapers are so closely aligned to Beijing and Taipei. “Both sides create heroes out of nobodies and nobodies out of people who are really doing something in the community,” complained a prominent Chinese American leader.

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The consulate was established amid controversy. Despite the FBI’s fears, the State Department approved the consulate.

The Los Angeles facility, with 31 staff members, is one of five in the country.

Even though it has no formal diplomatic relations with the U.S., Taiwan has more than a dozen similar installations in the country.

Although the Chinese Consulate’s staff circulates much more freely today than in the past, it has a reputation for being guarded about its own operations. Officials did not respond to written questions from The Times.

A staff roster shows that the consulate is divided into areas of responsibility, including culture, science and technology, and commercial affairs, which have assumed greater importance as China increases its profile in the global economy. The consulate hosts trade delegations from China, some of whom are seeking U.S. investors.

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Because of China’s authoritarian tradition and in some cases their personal suffering under communism, many Chinese immigrants harbor mistrust of the consulate and see the long arm of Beijing almost everywhere:

A man alleges that his brother was forced out of a travel agency because word got back to Chinese officials that he had been critical of China. Former reporters at a Chinese-language newspaper say consulate officials tried to pressure the management to run fewer stories about Taiwan.

Others suspect that the influx of visiting scholars and the expansion of Chinese businesses in the U.S. enable Beijing to spy on its own people and to acquire technology.

“Not all visiting scholars are spies, but they are still Chinese officials,” said economist George Lee, a former commercial attache at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing who now heads the U.S.-Soviet Institute at San Francisco State University.

“It is common for them to gather information on their own people, collect intelligence on high tech and whatever they can find.”

Lee of Panda TV said many criticisms of consulate officials and the Chinese government are unfounded and unfair. “When you talk about Communists, [the critics] think they are monsters or ghosts,” she said. “But they are well-educated and good-quality people.”

Many Chinese Americans find the half-century-old fight between China and Taiwan distasteful because they want a peacefully reunited China. “This is like two brothers fighting,” said Irvin Lai, board chairman of the Chinese Historical Society of Southern California and a third-generation Chinese American.