These kinds of characterisations frustrate me. It's a horrible simplification that leads one to a whole set of conclusions that are probably way off target. No complex society runs without rules. By and large, if members of the society do not follow those rules then the result is chaos. Clearly, China is not a lawless state where people do whatever they choose and the strongest one wins. It is a country with real laws and and vast majority of people need to follow those laws. These laws are, of course, not applied universally. However, we can point to examples of this non-universality of law in every single country on Earth. The question is the extent of that non-universality.

The other thing that's important to realise is that the Chinese government is incredibly complex internally. There isn't some Bond-like villain stroking his white cat all day and issuing decrees. It's a massive beaurocracy. Politics are crazy. The totalitarian state does not act as a single will -- it's a massive system of infighting and people trying to get the upper hand. Within that system, each of the players will be using their legal system against one another. It really isn't the case that there is any one entity that's just making up the rules as they go along and that can do whatever they want with impunity (as your posting implies to me).

So, I'm inclined to lean towards believing a more complex reality than "they forced him to say that".