A public security bureau in China refers to a government office essentially acting as a police station or a local or provincial police; the smallest police stations are called police posts. The PSB system is similar in concept to the Japanese Kōban system, and is present in each province and municipality. Typically, a PSB handles policing, public security, and social order. Other duties include residence registration and internal and external migration matters, such as the registration of temporary residents. The system of public security bureaus is administered by the Ministry of Public Security, which co-ordinates the work of provincial public security bureaus that are also answerable to the local governments and branches of the Communist Party of China. Provincial public security bureaus in turn administer county or district level public security sub-bureaus and branch bureaus, which perform a role similar to larger police stations. The lowest level outposts are police posts, which perform a role similar to small local police stations. The network of public security bureaus and the Ministry of Public Security should not be confused with the separate but parallel network of state security bureaus, administered at the national level by the Ministry of State Security, which is responsible for external and internal intelligence, and performs a "secret police" role. The two systems are administratively separate, although at local levels they co-operate to a large extent and often share resources. Most major Chinese cities will have a PSB assigned to deal with local security needs. Each province, municipality and autonomous region has a provincial-level Public Security Department or municipal PSB to deal with provincial security issues. In 2016, the Xinjiang PSB signed a partnership agreement with Huawei. In 2019, the same PSB and of its subordinate municipal PSBs were sanctioned by the U.S. Government for their role in human rights abuses against the Uyghurs.
