The US Department of Justice has charged 13 Chinese citizens, including two PRC intelligence officers, for trying to disrupt a US prosecution of the Chinese telecommunication firm Huawei, reports AP news agency.
Guochun He and Zheng Wang—the two Chinese intelligence officers who remain at large—were accused of buying out a US government employee to provide confidential information about the Justice Department’s probe against Huawei.
The company’s identity was not revealed in the court documents, but several US media reported that the matter referred to Huawei.
It is said that the government employee was paid about $41,000 in Bitcoin for the information on witnesses, trial evidence and potential new charges from the US Attorney’s Office in Brooklyn, New York.
However, the person the Chinese spies contacted was actually working as a double agent for the FBI.
“The defendants believed they had recruited the US government employee as an asset. But in fact, the individual they recruited was actually a double agent, working on behalf of the FBI,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said.
Last year, that person had passed a single-page classified document that contained information about a purported plan to charge and arrest Huawei executives in the US, they said. However, the confidential document was actually inaccurate.
“Over the past week, the justice department has taken several actions to disrupt criminal activity by individuals working on behalf of the government of the People’s Republic of China,” Garland said in a speech.
Also read | Rishi Sunak set to become UK PM, first of Indian heritage
He announced charges against “two PRC intelligence officers with attempting to obstruct influence and impede a criminal prosecution of a PRC-based telecommunications company.”
Also read | Huawei may be evading US sanctions through a small start-up: Report
FBI Director Christopher Wray said that these cases “lays bare the Chinese government’s flagrant violation of international laws, as they work to project their authoritarian view around the world.”
“They try to silence anyone who fights back against their theft – companies, politicians, individuals. Just as they try to silence anyone who fights back against their other aggressions.”
(With inputs from agencies)
WATCH WION LIVE HERE:
