Links to the Chinese Communist Party CCG is a member of an alliance of think tanks, coordinated by the
International Department of the Chinese Communist Party, that support the
Belt and Road Initiative. Wang Huiyao, president of CCG, was previously a vice chairman of the
Western Returned Scholars Association (WRSA). He has been a standing director of the
China Overseas Friendship Association (COFA). CCG has argued that it is financed primarily by private and corporate donors without government funding, and that Wang's involvement with the WRSA was merely an advisory role on its council, not formal employment. In 2023, CCG denied being "founded, run, or financed" by the WRSA, explaining that to navigate the stringent legal requirements for private think tanks, the organization hadincorrectly said WRSA was one initiator of CCG. In trying to survive, exist, and develop, CCG staff took advantage of what was plausibly available in an imperfect development environment and felt then it was preferable to mention what could be its most plausible link to an organization with over 100 years of history—longer than the CPC or PRC.
Wilson Center panel In 2018, the
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars invited CCG president Wang Huiyao to a Kissinger Institute panel on Chinese influence operations in Washington, DC on May 9. In a letter to the Wilson Center, U.S. Senator
Marco Rubio, then chair of the
Congressional-Executive Commission on China, asked the think tank to disclose Wang's affiliation with the United Front Work Department (UFWD). He visited the Wilson Center in person in 2019 and spoke virtually at a panel in 2020.
Collaboration with Semafor In March 2023, U.S. news startup
Semafor launched its "China and Global Business" initiative in partnership with CCG and the
Chinese foreign ministry-affiliated China Public Diplomacy Association.
Justin B. Smith, CEO of Semafor, wrote that the company was not "under the illusion that Chinese business leaders or other local groups operate independently of the Chinese Communist Party." Due to Chinese legal requirements, however, CCG "will take on local administrative responsibilities and coordinate with local sponsors, and Semafor will pay CCG for their services. The platform will be exclusively underwritten by corporate partnerships with no financial contributions from our local Chinese partners or the Chinese government." Sara Fischer and Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, reporting for
Axios, wrote that the "speech and activities of Chinese Communist Party-linked groups are strongly influenced by Beijing. Semafor has not detailed how it plans to disclose to its audiences during live events or via digital coverage details about the group's affiliation to the CCP." ==See also==