Four Chinese policemen have arrested on October 3 the head of a Tibetan medical college just outside United Nations’ refugee agency office building in Ulaanbaatar with the help of more than 10 Mongolian police officers, Radio Free Asia reported on October 21.

 But the Mongolian national legal enforcement agencies have denied that “no such arrest has happened.” The news centerpieces in local Mongolian media outlets as “strongly condemn” act of Chinese police. Batzangaa, 35, a Chinese national and ethnic Inner Mongolian, was deported back to China together with his wife Bayanhuaar and their nine-year old daughter. According to the New York-based Southern Mongolian Human Rights Information Center (SMHRIC), the three were deported on the same day with no apparent recourse to Mongolian legal proceedings to challenge the deportation order. They were reported to have applied for political asylum from UN Refugee agency in Ulaanbaatar.

“They brought us back from Mongolia [to China]. At the time, they told us it was because we owed someone money because we set up a school of Tibetan medicine, and they were suing us to get it back, that it was ‘economic fraud’,” told Bayanhuaar to RFA.Before leaving China, Batzangaa was reported to have set up and run the Ordos Mongol-Tibetan Medical School of traditional Tibetan medicine in 2001, and had a series of disputes with the Chinese authorities over the right to maintain the school’s ethnic characteristics.

“The Chinese authorities put the school under surveillance, alarmed by its growing ties with Tibetans and Mongolians, and canceled the school’s land lease, citing “the authorities’ suspicion and surveillance towards ethnic minorities” in its official documents, the SMHRIC said. “The three entered into Mongolia under 30-day visa in May 2009. But they stayed in Mongolia illegally for five months. According to Mongolian laws, foreign citizens staying more than 30 days must register with our agency within seven days of arrival. However, they did not register with us. It is true that the police authorities cooperated with us to locate where he is. It was not an arrest.

There is no violation of laws and regulations of Mongolia. We do not know that he applied for political asylum or not,” answered Colonel D.Murun, chief officer of the Office of Immigration, Naturalization and Foreign Citizens, in a question of Zuunii Medee reporter on how the Chinese police have the legal capacity to make an arrest on the territory of Mongolia.“Our officers just asked the United Nations Refugee Agency Office to bring Batzangaa for a meeting, and he came to us and met with the person from the Inner Mongolian customs and immigration authority,” he added. He said that Batzangaa owed CNY52 million to a local authority, and cooperated with Chinese authorities to locate Batzangaa and deport him back home. He said that the immigration agency of Mongolia fined Banzangaa for his illegal stay in Mongolia.