Passport in Hand, But You May Not Be Able to Leave

On September 15, 2026, a new regulation will come into effect. The provision is not long, containing only 19 articles; but any one of them is enough to make anyone holding a Chinese passport, or anyone who has ever had a connection to Chinese identity, reconsider the weight of the words “returning home.”

When “Going Back for a Meeting” Becomes “Unable to Return”

In March this year, two young Chinese technology entrepreneurs returned from Singapore to Beijing for a meeting at the invitation of China’s National Development and Reform Commission. They were Xiao Hong, co-founder of artificial intelligence company Manus, and its chief scientist, Ji Yichao — a star AI company that had only last year been described by observers as “the second DeepSeek moment.” At the time, Meta was preparing to acquire the company for approximately US$2 billion.

After the meeting ended, the two were told that they could not leave China during the regulatory review. They were free to travel within the country, but they could not leave.

Neither Xiao Hong nor Ji Yichao had committed a crime, nor had they been charged. There had not even been any formal legal proceedings. Yet at that moment, the passports in their hands were effectively useless.

If you think this has nothing to do with you — perhaps it is worth thinking again. Because on July 31, 2026, the State Council of China published the Regulations of the State Council on Exit and Entry Administration (State Council Decree No. 841), which will formally take effect on September 15. One entirely new provision in these regulations could turn experiences like those of Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao from “special cases” into something expressly authorised by law.

Nineteen Articles, One Provision Enough to Change the Rules

The official name of the regulation is the Regulations of the State Council on Exit and Entry Administration. Signed by Premier Li Qiang, it contains 19 articles. The government says its purpose is to “regulate exit and entry administration, safeguard the lawful rights and interests of persons entering and leaving the country,” and “safeguard national sovereignty, security and development interests.”

It sounds highly official, but what is truly worth paying attention to is Article 4. It sets out three circumstances in which Chinese citizens “shall not be permitted to leave the country.” The first two — receiving administrative penalties for fraud involving exit and entry documents, and engaging in criminal activities overseas that endanger national security — are, to some extent, continuations of existing practices. The real new element lies in the third provision:

“Where a person violates regulations on export controls, technology import and export administration, or other relevant provisions, and may endanger national industrial security or technological security, the competent departments of the State Council, such as the commerce authorities, may decide not to permit the person to leave the country.”

At first glance, this sentence may seem unremarkable. But when broken down, there are three points that should concern every overseas Chinese person:

First, there is no time limit. The first two provisions specify “six months to three years,” whereas the third provision makes no mention whatsoever of an expiry period. In theory, a person could be prohibited from leaving the country indefinitely.

Second, the decision is given to commerce authorities without requiring a court. Such a restriction does not result from a judicial process, but from a decision by an administrative authority. There is no trial, no confrontation, and not necessarily any opportunity for a lawyer to intervene.

Third, the words “may endanger” leave the interpretation entirely in the hands of those enforcing the rule. The regulation itself does not provide any specific technology list, nor does it specify which industries or activities constitute a threat to “industrial security.” Today, it may be artificial intelligence and semiconductors; tomorrow, it could be any industry. And the scope can be expanded by administrative authorities at any time — an individual’s freedom to leave the country is not protected by this provision, but instead depends on the authorities’ judgement at the time.

The cases of Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao are effectively a preview of this new provision. At the time, the National Development and Reform Commission’s request for the two to remain in China had not invoked Article 4, because the regulation had not yet taken effect. But the logic was exactly the same: reviewing an acquisition involving the transfer of technology, while restricting the parties involved from leaving the country. After September 15, this approach will have an explicit legal basis. The U.S. House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party described the incident as sending a message: “There is no such thing as a truly ‘private’ technology company in China.”

Three Names, Three Ways of Being Trapped

The legal provisions may sound abstract, but over the past decade, too many real people have demonstrated through their own loss of freedom just how far China’s exit controls can go.

Cheng Lei: “I Haven’t Seen a Tree in Three Years”

Cheng Lei moved from Hunan to Australia with her family when she was ten. She studied commerce at the University of Queensland before returning to China, where she became a financial presenter for the state-run CGTN. On August 13, 2020, she was taken away by national security officers at the headquarters of China Central Television in Beijing. She would not return for three years.

There was no public trial and no formal announcement of the charges. Even her family and friends did not know what she had allegedly done. It was not until she was released and returned to Melbourne in 2023 that China’s Ministry of State Security confirmed for the first time that she had been charged with “illegally providing state secrets to overseas entities” and sentenced to two years and 11 months — a sentence announced only after she had already completed it.

While in prison, Cheng Lei wrote a letter to the Australian people: “I was allowed only ten hours outdoors a year,” and “I haven’t seen a tree in three years.” In her book, she recalled quietly reciting the names of places she had visited or driven past in Australia while in prison — reminding herself that she was still a living person.

Cheng Lei’s story reminds us of one thing: having once been a public figure in China’s state media, having once been trusted and employed by the Chinese government, does not mean you are immune. Identity has never been a one-way protective shield.

Gui Minhai: A Nationality That Was “Restored”

Gui Minhai, a shareholder of Hong Kong’s Causeway Bay Books, became a naturalised Swedish citizen in 1996. In 2015, he suddenly “disappeared” while travelling in Thailand, before later “reappearing” at an unknown location in mainland China. In 2018, he was taken away for a second time while travelling by train to Beijing, accompanied by Swedish diplomatic personnel.

In 2020, the Ningbo Intermediate People’s Court sentenced him to ten years in prison for “illegally providing intelligence to overseas entities.” The court’s announcement stated that Gui Minhai had “lawfully restored Chinese nationality upon his own application” in 2018.

The Swedish government’s response was clear: under Swedish law, renouncing or restoring nationality must be formally approved by the Swedish Migration Agency. Gui Minhai had never gone through such a procedure. Under Swedish law, he had never ceased to be a Swedish citizen. In other words, China unilaterally declaring that he had “become Chinese again” served a very clear purpose — once his Chinese nationality was “restored,” in the eyes of Chinese law, he was simply a Chinese citizen residing in China, leaving foreign consular authorities with no basis to intervene.

This is not an isolated practice. Just days after the new regulations were announced, a Chinese businessman who had lived in Japan was reportedly detained after returning to China to visit family. It was reported that his Chinese nationality had similarly been “restored,” and that he was restricted from leaving the country for as long as ten years. Because the incident was submitted anonymously and was based on a single account, it has not been possible to fully verify the claim. But commentators have pointed to a more important fact: even if the specific account is questionable, the mechanism and precedent of “forced restoration of nationality” do genuinely exist — the Gui Minhai case in 2018 had already established a precedent. China’s Nationality Law stipulates that restoration of nationality is approved by the Ministry of Public Security. Who has their nationality “restored,” and when, is entirely subject to the interpretation of the public security authorities. Those affected may only learn about it afterwards, or may not know at all.

The purpose of this practice is straightforward: once someone has had their Chinese nationality “restored,” in the eyes of Chinese law, they are simply a Chinese citizen residing in China, meaning foreign governments’ consular protection naturally does not apply. More than ten years have now passed since the Gui Minhai incident. On the tenth anniversary of his abduction in October 2025, Sweden’s Foreign Minister still had to personally raise the matter with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and demand his release. Ten years later, there has still been no progress, and it remains unclear where he is actually being held.

For Hong Kong-born people living in Australia, this precedent is particularly concerning: even if they have held Australian citizenship for many years, if Chinese authorities unilaterally declare that their Chinese nationality has been “restored,” they could potentially lose the protection of Australian consular assistance in an instant. From the perspective of international law, such a unilateral determination may itself constitute a violation of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. In practice, however, those affected often have limited effective avenues of appeal.

Richard O’Halloran: A Man Who Was Never Involved in the Dispute

This case may not be widely known, but it best demonstrates how fragile “innocence” can be in the face of an exit ban.

Irish businessman Richard O’Halloran had only joined the company shortly before a commercial dispute completely unrelated to him broke out. Yet when the company became involved in civil litigation, he was prohibited from leaving China — trapped for three years, from 2019 to 2022. The international protection organisation Safeguard Defenders has pointed out that such cases are not uncommon. Dozens of foreigners have reportedly been prevented from leaving China because of civil or commercial disputes involving their companies, many of whom had no direct connection to the disputes themselves.

Another widely reported case involved a Singaporean executive at the U.S. due diligence firm Mintz Group, who was similarly restricted from leaving China in connection with the company’s business investigations. Analysts have said bluntly that exit bans completely tilt the balance of power in commercial disputes — once one side holds the card of “not allowing the other party to leave,” the bargaining power becomes fundamentally unequal.

For a Chinese person doing business in Australia and maintaining commercial ties with China, this case is particularly relevant — you do not have to commit a crime, or even personally participate in a dispute. Simply because your company, business partner, or even former employer becomes involved in civil litigation in China, you could potentially become trapped there without knowing when you will be able to return home.

It is worth noting that such exit bans are, under Chinese law, mostly not part of criminal proceedings, but an administrative measure attached to civil litigation. According to statistics from the international research organisation Safeguard Defenders, at least 14 laws and dozens of regulations, judicial interpretations and policy documents in mainland China involve this type of border control. In the absence of transparency, the impression is that various government departments, and even local neighbourhood committees, can request that law enforcement authorities place someone under border control. Even more troubling is this: putting someone on a border-control list can be extremely easy, while removing them can be exceptionally difficult. There have been analyses of individual businessmen becoming trapped under indefinite border controls simply because the task force originally established to investigate them had disbanded before the restrictions were lifted — effectively leaving no one with the authority, or even the memory, to sign off on their release.

These Are Not Isolated Incidents, But the Same Logic

Cheng Lei, Gui Minhai, O’Halloran, Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao — five cases that appear completely different in nature (espionage charges against a journalist, “treason” charges against a publisher, a commercial dispute, and a technology export review) — actually share the same underlying logic: administrative authorities can determine whether a person is allowed to leave China without a public trial, without a clear time limit, and without transparent avenues for redress.

In the past, this logic was scattered across different laws and departmental powers. Enforcement standards were unclear, and outsiders could only piece together the bigger picture through individual cases. Now, Article 4, Clause 3 of the Regulations of the State Council on Exit and Entry Administration formally turns this logic into an administrative provision with legal authority, explicitly granting the power to commerce authorities — a body that has previously had less direct involvement in exit controls.

The historical context of this change is not difficult to understand. As technological competition between China and the United States intensifies, rare earths, batteries, artificial intelligence, semiconductors and advanced materials have become key battlegrounds for export controls. Preventing the outflow of critical technologies and talent is a clear policy priority for the Chinese government. The Manus incident shook the industry precisely because it demonstrated that even if a company’s headquarters have moved to Singapore and its founders have relocated there, simply returning to China for a meeting, while its technology is still considered to have originated in China, could result in them suddenly becoming trapped. As one commentator put it vividly: “Human capital is no longer mobile; it is geofenced.”

This national-security-first approach will not necessarily stop at artificial intelligence and semiconductors. The regulation does not list any specific industries. The interpretation of the words “may endanger” lies entirely with the enforcing authorities, and the scope can be expanded at any time. A provision that appears unrelated to you today could suddenly apply to you tomorrow because of the industry you work in or a transaction you participate in.

Three Thousand Years of the Middle Kingdom, and After the Roman Empire: A Collision of Two Concepts of Borders

To understand why Gui Minhai could have his nationality “restored,” or why Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao could still be restricted from leaving China after relocating to Singapore, perhaps we need to look at the deeper historical context. This may not be the only explanation, but it is certainly a framework often used by scholars of China as a reference point.

Traditional Chinese conceptions of Tianxia were not based on the modern international-law concept of “sovereign states, each possessing fixed borders.” Within the imperial system, China viewed itself as the centre of civilisation, while surrounding peoples existed within relationships of tribute or assimilation. The distinction between identities was not based on a clearly defined legal border, but on the distinction between “Chinese civilisation and the barbarians” — whether one identified with or was attached to this civilisational centre.

This way of thinking continued into the modern era. Overseas Chinese were traditionally referred to as “Huaqiao” — Chinese people residing overseas, rather than immigrants who had completely severed their connection. Under this underlying cultural logic, “once Chinese, always Chinese” is not merely a slogan, but a deeply rooted worldview: bloodline and cultural origins are regarded as the true basis of identity. A foreign passport has never been regarded within this framework as an absolute point of separation.

By contrast, the Western modern concept of the sovereign state gradually developed through centuries of fragmentation and restructuring following the collapse of the Roman Empire. After Rome fell, Europe entered a long period of feudal division, with blurred borders and overlapping loyalties. The logic that “each state possesses a fixed territory, equal sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs” only began to take shape with the 1648 Peace of Westphalia. After several centuries of development in international law, it evolved into today’s modern logic that nationality is a clear legal boundary: once a person changes nationality, their former country no longer has the right to claim them as its citizen. Giving up one nationality and acquiring another is a legal fact mutually recognised by both sides, and cannot be unilaterally overturned because of bloodline or place of birth.

This comparison helps us understand an apparent contradiction: China, as a member state of the United Nations, formally accepts the modern system of sovereign states and, in order to maintain the clear legal boundary of “not recognising dual nationality,” is meticulous in its legal texts. Yet in the Gui Minhai case, the Chinese government simply stated that he had “restored Chinese nationality upon his own application,” thereby unilaterally redefining a person who had never lost his Swedish nationality under Swedish law as Chinese.

This approach uses the language of modern nationality law on the surface, but at its core is closer to a pre-modern concept of civilisational identity in which “if you are ethnically Chinese, you can never truly leave.” For Chinese Australians accustomed to the Western understanding that nationality is a clear legal boundary, this is particularly important to recognise.

Your Background Determines Your Risk

The impact of these regulations on the Chinese community in Australia is not uniform. Because of differences in birthplace, passport history and identity recognition, people from different backgrounds face significantly different levels of actual risk.

People born in Hong Kong face relatively high risks. China considers Hong Kong part of its territory and does not recognise British colonial rule as having legally severed Chinese identity. Even if they hold a foreign passport and have become Australian citizens, they may still have a significant chance of being regarded as people with “connections to Chinese identity” when entering mainland China, and therefore be subject to the exit restrictions. Those who hold a Home Return Permit, or who can otherwise demonstrate connections to Hong Kong or mainland China, should exercise particular caution — the Gui Minhai-style “restoration of nationality” already has a precedent.

Chinese people who migrated to Australia from Southeast Asia — Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore and others — generally face lower risks, but that does not mean zero risk. Most ethnic Chinese in these regions have been settled there for multiple generations and hold passports of those countries, which China recognises as independent sovereign states. Generally speaking, those who have never held a People’s Republic of China passport or household registration are less likely to be directly subject to provisions concerning Chinese citizens being prohibited from leaving the country. However, China may still traditionally regard people of Chinese heritage as “overseas Chinese,” and in extreme circumstances — particularly where sensitive industries are involved — they may still attract additional attention.

People who migrated to Australia from Taiwan face a particularly sensitive and unique risk. China claims sovereignty over Taiwan and does not recognise Taiwan as an independent country. People holding Taiwanese passports or identity documents are often placed under a special administrative framework when entering mainland China, rather than simply being treated as “foreigners.” If they are involved in technology exchanges or commercial activities, or are deemed to “potentially endanger national security or industrial security,” the potential risk of being restricted from leaving China cannot be ignored.

Australian permanent residents or citizens who currently hold or have previously held Chinese passports or household registration face the highest risk. Regardless of their original place of birth, these individuals are the most likely to be regarded as Chinese citizens and therefore face the greatest risk of being directly subject to Article 4.

For ordinary people who are simply visiting family, travelling, and have no connection whatsoever to technology or export controls, the risk is relatively low. Those who genuinely need to be more alert are people with technology backgrounds, cross-border business dealings, or those who frequently travel using Chinese-related identities.

Conclusion: This Is About More Than One Journey

The emergence of the Regulations of the State Council on Exit and Entry Administration is a product of technological competition between China and the United States and a national-security-first mindset. But it also continues a deeper tradition — throughout Chinese history, China has never truly been a country of completely “free movement.” From the maritime bans of the Ming dynasty to today’s entry and exit administration, control over the movement of people has never truly disappeared.

For every Chinese person living in Australia, these regulations serve as a reminder of one thing: cross-border identity has never been a one-way choice. Your birthplace, your passport history and your current nationality can all affect how the other side defines who you are — and that power of definition may not be in your hands.

Cheng Lei was once a public figure in Chinese state media. Gui Minhai once believed Swedish nationality was a protective shield. Xiao Hong and Ji Yichao once believed that moving their company to Singapore meant they had completed their “decoupling.” Before the incidents happened, each of them probably never imagined that they would become the next case.

September 15 is approaching. Understanding the contents, remaining compliant and carefully assessing the risks are the most practical approaches for now — replacing simple anxiety or disregard with calmness and preparation.

It is important to emphasise that the purpose of this article is neither to create panic nor to urge everyone to sever their ties with China from now on. The everyday family visits and travel of the vast majority of ordinary people are not expected to be directly affected. What truly needs attention is where the boundaries of the rules lie, how transparent their enforcement is, and whether your own background and activities could potentially fall into the category of “sensitive” one day. Understanding the risks does not mean giving up family ties or one’s roots. On the contrary, it is hoped that every reader can make their own choices with a clear understanding of the situation.

Because for every overseas Chinese person who once believed they had “already left,” what is at stake has never been merely one journey. It is about how securely we can establish our lives and livelihoods between different systems and frameworks of identity. This is a question worth every reader and every family seriously considering before September 15.