Technically yeah, But not exactly Peace officer.
I mean how do you fight crime that doesn’t end up destroying half the building or killing the criminals with a grenade launcher? That’s normal in Movies and Comics where reality doesn’t matter hence mu OCP reference to Robocop. A fictional realm where shootings are constant and gangs are armed to the teeth. Judge Dredd, Mad Max, Robocop, Last action hero, Tank Police. Dystopias where law and order has broken down and civil war is the order of the day.
However is that where China is? Neither of us would say so.
I am a known critic of the CCP, but even I am kinda shocked here. I doubt they are actually using it yet even having it walks that line between Police and Military.
Despite their name, PAP are not merely "armed police" like how one may think of SWAT, but rather they are full on gendarmarie.
Some of those Gendarmarie for China of course have to deal with opfor that can be fairly well armed themselves in some regions. You're obviuosly not going to be sending PAP armed like in those pictures, towards a lone criminal armed with a butcher's knife or a black market pistol that has a hostage or two.
You'll be sending in those heavily armed PAP for multiple people in an armed group with some small arms of their own to be able to destroy them with massive overwhelming small arms firepower of your own. There's a reason why PAP have some of their own semi armoured vehicles for transport, it's not because they're cosplaying as regular military but rather it's just enough for what's needed to deal with the level of threats that exist.
Other nations that face similar threats also have Gendarmarie of their own that are up to similarly armed or equipped, e.g.: Turkey.
But as far as the day to day armament of actual regular police, China's LEOs are far less heavily armed (if armed at all) compared to certain other nations in the world.
There's a difference between "militarization of police forces" versus "military force with some limited policing duties". The latter is very much the PAP. The former, is something else.