Dong Guangping spent years trying to reach his family. This week, after a journey that took him across an open sea in a small inflatable boat, he finally did.

A long-sought arrival

Dong, 68, arrived in Toronto and reunited with his wife and daughter, who had already been resettled in Canada, the Associated Press reported. The arrival was announced by Sheng Xue, a Chinese Canadian activist and friend. Dong said the welcome felt "so warm," and told supporters his first meal in Canada was a simple bowl of noodles, according to The Globe and Mail.

From police officer to dissident

Dong's path to exile began in 1999, when, as a former police officer, he signed a petition supporting victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. He was dismissed from his post and, over the following years, imprisoned repeatedly on charges such as "inciting subversion of state power," the AP reported. In 2015 he fled with his family to Thailand, where they were accepted as refugees by Canada — but Dong was forcibly returned to China by Thai authorities and jailed again while his wife and daughter reached safety.

By his and his supporters' account, Beijing imprisoned him four times in all.

Four escapes, one success

Each of Dong's attempts to leave China read like a study in desperation. After his deportation from Thailand, he tried to reach the Taiwanese-controlled island of Kinmen, only to be pulled from the water and returned to the mainland. He later crossed into Vietnam, was arrested there in 2022, and served nearly a year for illegal border crossing before being sent back.

His fourth attempt, in May, was the most extreme. Setting out from China's eastern coast in a roughly 3.3-meter rubber dinghy, he aimed for Japan, hundreds of kilometers away. After more than a day at sea, his engine failed and his small craft drifted; he had covered hundreds of kilometers when a fishing boat rescued him off South Korea's west coast, CNN reported. South Korean authorities detained him over immigration violations, and he spent about a month in limbo there before Canada arranged his resettlement.

The long reach of repression

Human-rights groups say Dong's ordeal illustrates what they call China's transnational repression — the pressure Beijing brings to bear, sometimes through third countries, to return dissidents to its jurisdiction. Thailand and Vietnam, both with close ties to China, sent him back despite international refugee norms.

Now in Toronto, Dong has said he hopes to find ordinary work, even as he remains wary of the possibility of harassment by Chinese agents abroad — a fear that advocacy groups say is well grounded for many exiled activists. For now, after more than a decade of trying, he is simply home.