By MailOnline Reporter 23 Jun 2020
Guo Wengui accused Beijing of silencing the Vatican on religious matters
The exiled billionaire alleged China started to pay the Holy See from 2014
The dissident said countries including Italy and Australia were also muzzled
He made the bombshell claims on a US show hosted by an ex-Trump adviser
An exiled billionaire has accused the Chinese government of giving the Vatican £1.6billion every year in bribes to prevent it from criticising Beijing’s sweeping clampdown on religions.
Fugitive tycoon Guo Wengui claimed in a podcast that the Communist Party had been paying the Holy See generously since 2014 because Beijing ‘wanted the Vatican to shut up about China’s religion policies.’
US-based Guo, 52, said in the interview that the Communist country had also spent large sums to muzzle other countries – including Italy and Australia – from voicing concerns.
Steve Bannon (pictured), a former Trump strategist, spoke to the Chinese fugitive tycoon Guo Wengui in an interview on Bannon’s self-launched radio show ‘The War Room’ on June 20.
The billionaire’s comment comes after China faced widespread criticism over its crackdown on the country’s religious groups, particularly the ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims.
Guo, who is known for his criticism against the Communist Party, made his bombshell claims on June 20 during an interview with The War Room, an American podcast hosted by an ex-Trump adviser, Steve Bannon.
The highly wanted dissident said that the Chinese Communist Party had been allocating £1.6billion each year to gain influence over the Vatican in the past six years.
‘[They] want Vatican to shut up and follow the CCP about the religion polices,’ Guo said on the radio show. ‘That is disaster.’
The Chinese dissident also claimed that the Chinese government was paying the Holy See with $100million (£80million) before 2014, without specifying when those payments initially started.
‘CCP knows, if the Vatican tells the truth about Chinese Christians and Catholics, CCP is die,’ Guo said.
‘CCP is so worried, so they give two billion [dollars] to the Vatican, 1.5 billion [dollars] to Australia, 100million [dollars] to Italy,’ he added.
Guo has developed a relationship with Bannon – who has also been an outspoken critic of the Chinese Communist Party.
The two announced their plans to set up a $100million investigation into Chinese corruption in November, the New York Times reported.
Guo’s interview comes as China has been heavily criticised by other countries and humanitarian groups over its policy against Muslims and other religious groups.
UN experts and activists have claimed that at least one million ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims are held in the detention centres in the region.
Former detainees claimed that Muslims were forced to eat pork and speak Mandarin in those internment camps.
After initially denying their existence, China acknowledged that it had opened ‘vocational education centres’ in Xinjiang aimed at preventing extremism by teaching Mandarin and job skills.
Who are the Chinese Muslims?
Muslims are not a new presence in China. Most of China’s Muslim communities, including the Hui, Uighurs and Kazakhs, have lived in China for more than 1,000 years, according to fact tank Pew Research Center.
The largest concentrations of Muslims today are in the western provinces of Xinjiang, Ningxia, Qinghai and Gansu.
A substantial number of Muslims live in the cities of Beijing, Xi’an, Tianjin and Shanghai.
Chinese Muslim men take part in gathering for the celebration of the Muslim holiday, Eid al-Adha, or the Muslim Feast of the Sacrifice, at the Niu Jie mosque in Beijing, China
They make up about two per cent of the 1.4 billion population in China. However, as the country is so populous, its Muslim population is expected to be the 19th largest in the world in 2030.
The Muslim population in China is projected to increase from 23.3 million in 2010 to nearly 30 million in 2030.
Those who grow up and live in places dominated by the Han Chinese have little knowledge about Islam – or religions in general – thus view it as a threat.
Beijing’s policymakers are predominately Han.
At the same time, radical Muslim Uighurs have killed hundreds in recent years, causing China to implement even more extreme measures to quash potential separatist movements.
Uighurs in particular have long been used to heavy-handed curbs on dress, religious practice and travel after a series of deadly riots in 2009 in Urumqi, according to the Financial Times.
Schoolchildren were banned from fasting during Ramadan and attending religious events while parents were banned from giving newborns Muslim names such as ‘Mohammed’ and ‘Jihad’.
Certain symbols of Islam, such as beards and the veil, were also forbidden. Women with face-covering veils are sometimes not allowed on buses. Unauthorised pilgrimages to Mecca were also restricted.
PAT SAYS
Judas got his 30 pieces of silver.
Here is the Vatican getting £ 1.6 billion a year for letting the Chinese Government choose bishops and keeping stum about the Chinese Government’s murderous human rights record with regard to it’s own citizens, the people of Hong Kong, Catholics, Christian’s and Muslims.
Of course Francis himself colluded with the junta in his native Argentina, including in the killing of two Jesuits, and God knows how many others?
This is not just playing horrible politics with horrible people.
Staying silent in front of the torture and mass killing is nothing short of EVIL and SATANIC.
Cardinal Zen of Hong Kong is a voice crying in the wilderness and has also been betrayed by the Vatican and the 200 cardinals he wrote to about Chinese atrocities.
I terms of evil, there is no real difference between the likes of Islamic terrorists and the Vatican.
The Vatican too, is a centre of religion based terrorism.
There has to be a HELL. And it.must be full of religious murders and their enablers?
BISHOP PAT BUCKLEY 