PM Rishi Sunak confronts China's premier after arrest of parliament 'spy'

[Vanguard One]

Rishi Sunak met China's premier Li Qiang at the G20 summit after two men were arrested amid reports a parliamentary researcher spied for China. Mr Sunak said interference in UK parliamentary democracy was "obviously unacceptable".

Rishi Sunak has confronted China's premier about Chinese interference in the UK's parliamentary democracy.

It comes after two men were arrested under the Official Secrets Act amid reports a parliamentary researcher spied for China.


The researcher, who is in his 20s, is understood to have had links to security minister Tom Tugendhat, foreign affairs committee chairwoman Alicia Kearns and other senior Tory MPs.

Mr Sunak met Chinese premier Li Qiang, who is attending the G20 summit in India in place of President Xi Jinping, on the fringes of the gathering's final session on Sunday morning.

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Speaking after the meeting, Mr Sunak said he raised his "very strong concern" about interference with parliamentary democracy, which he said was "obviously unacceptable".

It was the "right approach" to talk face-to-face with China's premier, he said.

"Where there are areas of disagreement… I'd rather be in the room directly expressing my concerns, and that’s what I did today."

The arrests were made in March and first revealed by The Sunday Times.



Mr Sunak has been clear China is an "epoch-defining" challenge, Justice Secretary Alex Chalk told Sky News' Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips.

He defended security in parliament, saying a "rigorous approach is taken" in terms of who is given a parliamentary pass.

Asked if there are weaknesses in the security system that need addressing, he said: "I don't think you should rule anything out."

Officers from the Metropolitan Police's Counter Terrorism Command, which oversees espionage-related offences, are investigating.

Mr Chalk said the investigation must "play through" and police and security services are taking this "seriously".

"Whatever lessons need to be learned by the parliamentary authorities I'm sure will be learned," he said.

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Asked about the view of some in parliament that China is a threat to the UK, Mr Chalk said "you can't wish China away", noting it is the second largest global economy and key to tackling the challenge of climate change.

"We have to engage, but we do so with our eyes open," he said.

Meanwhile, Conservative MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith has called for the alleged Chinese spy to be named in parliament, saying it is a "matter of national security".

The former Tory leader told Sky News the allegations are "very serious indeed", and said it's "not the first time" that Chinese spies have infiltrated parliament.

As a result of these infiltrations, he says it is "puzzling" that the government "still does not want to call China a systemic threat".

Asked about a report in The Spectator that MPs could use parliamentary privilege tomorrow to name the two men who were arrested - and particularly the parliamentary researcher - without fear of prosecution, Sir Iain said he is not planning on doing so himself, but has called on the security authorities to agree to him being named.

He said: "It's quite ridiculous to have this burbling around all over the [parliamentary] estate and nobody quite knowing who this is they were talking to."

Sir Iain added: "Until you know who this was, you don't know for certain whether they had encountered you, whether they've come to your office, whether they'd had any access to your staff - we just don't know until you know."

He continued: "It's not a matter of privilege really, it should be just a matter of national security, and then we can get on trying to figure out just how far this individual went."

It came after former cabinet minister and diplomat Rory Stewart told Sky News' Trevor Phillips that the UK needs to be "much, much more serious" about protecting itself against Chinese and Russian spies.

"It's in the interests of authoritarian states to weaken countries like the United Kingdom, so we should be very, very cautious," he said.

Both the allocation of parliamentary passes and the funding of MPs needed reviewing, he said.

"People with strong links to the Chinese Communist Party have been giving money to Labour MPs and employing former Conservative MPs," he said.

One of the men, in his 30s, was arrested in Oxfordshire on 13 March, while the other, in his 20s, was arrested in Edinburgh, Scotland Yard said.

"Searches were also carried out at both the residential properties, as well as at a third address in east London," a statement from the force said.

The MPs the researcher is linked to are privy to classified or highly sensitive information.

Both men were held at a south London police station until being bailed until early October.

Mr Tugendhat is said not to have had any contact with the researcher since before he became security minister in September last year.

Ms Kearns declined to comment, adding: "While I recognise the public interest, we all have a duty to ensure any work of the authorities is not jeopardised."

The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China pressure group said it was "appalled at reports of the infiltration of the UK Parliament by someone allegedly acting on behalf of the People's Republic of China".

PM Rishi Sunak confronts China's premier after arrest of parliament 'spy'

Rishi Sunak met China's premier Li Qiang at the G20 summit after two men were arrested amid reports a parliamentary researcher spied for China. Mr Sunak said interference in UK parliamentary democracy was "obviously unacceptable".

news.sky.com

 

[Nan Yang]

New China spy case about Tory aide sounds like more British paranoia

• The China threat has much more to do with the insecurity and indecision of the West towards the country, the emerging multipolar world and the erosion of Western dominance

Alex Lo
Published: 9:00pm, 12 Sep, 2023

First it was a big fat balloon observable from many kilometres from the ground that was supposedly spying on the United States. Now, a 20-something parliamentary researcher who liked to flirt on a dating app is suspected of being a China spy inside Westminster.

Some Anglo-American media are already warning or rather goading that the already fraught relationship between China and Britain is set for a free fall.

Frankly, the timings are more interesting than the disclosures themselves.

The Chinese weather balloon was tracked for many weeks by the Pentagon, which initially concluded it wasn’t a threat. Then some anti-China hawks in the US Congress were unhappy about a scheduled visit of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken to Beijing, and suddenly, American news headlines were all about the spy balloon. That, in turn, caused Blinken to postpone his trip.

This time around, the exposé of a Tory parliamentary researcher as an alleged China spy coincided nicely with a diplomatic mission to China by British Foreign Minister James Cleverly, who has been trying to make nice with the Chinese, up to a point, as the Brits like to say.

But the suspected spy, it turns out, was actually arrested long ago in March under a section of the Official Secrets Act that dates from 1911, but is so far not charged. He must have been – allegedly – committing some really obscure offence(s) for the authorities to resort to such an archaic law.

British anti-China hawks were unhappy about Cleverly’s China trip. Conveniently, the story broke. His boss, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, was forced to confront Premier Li Qiang at the Group of 20 summit over the allegations, which no doubt made those same hawks rather happy.

Now they are demanding that China be formally labelled a threat to Britain’s national security and interests. That, however, is being resisted by the more pragmatic elements inside the Tory government, such as Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, who has pointed out that Britain does need Chinese trade.

All that seems a bit premature. Isn’t it the great British people who first taught the world that suspects are innocent until proven guilty. Yet, when it comes to China, mere suspicion is enough to imply guilt.

The suspect’s case is especially questionable. The guy is out on bail and no charge has been laid. The law cited to make the arrest is more than a century old and is rarely used, let alone successfully, to convict foreign agents.

He had worked for a conservative think tank set up by Tom Tugendhat, the security minister, when he was a mere Tory member of parliament, and Alicia Kearns, the chairwoman of the foreign affairs select committee. Kearns, an ultra-anti-China hawk, claims China has threatened her family and she has demanded extra protection. The suspect is said to have access to sensitive information, but presumably not cabinet-level secrets; he worked for Tugendhat’s think tank, not his cabinet office.

Is he guilty or not? We wouldn’t know unless his case is brought to court. But that may not even happen. Considering the time lapse from his arrest and the obscurity of his alleged offence(s), it’s possible he won’t be charged at all.

China is supposed to be such a threat that MI5 and MI6, the domestic and foreign intelligence services, now have full discretion to work together in cases involving China. Yet, so far, not a single spy case has managed to reach the courts.

The suspect has taken the unusual step of issuing a public statement denying his guilt, even claiming he has been working “against the Chinese Communist Party”. Is he a spy, a double agent or a triple one? Did he even know he was spying for someone or something? This is John Le Carre territory. It reminds me of his Little Drummer Girl, whose main character was so daft she thought she was working for one side but ended up spying for the other.

Or maybe there was no spying for the suspect at all, and he was just a pawn in the political infighting between the government and the security services, and the hawkish lawmakers. We just don’t know.

What we do know is that the hawks have forced the Sunak government, which has tried to pursue a more pragmatic approach with Beijing, into a defensive position and may have to adopt a tougher line with the Chinese.

In fact, we have seen the same kind of infighting in practically all the major Western countries – between those who realise they have to live with China one way or another, and those who want to start world war three with it.

The Liberal government of Justin Trudeau has been forced to launch an official public inquiry into China’s alleged political interference in Canada even though a previous probe recommended there was no need for it.

The Labor government in Australia wants to sound more conciliatory with the Chinese than its Conservative predecessor, and yet has little room to manoeuvre under heavy pressure from Washington and the domestic hawkish opposition.

Meanwhile, mainstream Western news media have been drip-fed anti-China stories from undisclosed but official sources to compel public opinion to accept the China threat, however exaggerated.

The more I read those stories, the more I realise they are less about China than about the insecurity and indecision of the West towards the country, the emerging multipolar world and the erosion of Western dominance in global affairs.