UK Jails Two Over Espionage, Chinese Shadow Police Operation in London

A United Kingdom court jailed two men Thursday for their roles in a secret Chinese espionage operation conducted from an office in central London.

Bill Yuen, 66, was sentenced to eight years in prison under the National Security Act 2023 for assisting a foreign intelligence service.

Peter Wai, 41, received a 10-year sentence on the same charge, along with a count of misconduct in public office.

The Shadow Police Operation

The state-backed operation was run from the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) located on Bedford Square in central London.

Prosecutors at the Old Bailey stated the office was utilized to conduct "shadow police operations" on British soil.

Yuen, the HKETO office manager and third-in-command, acted as a handler for Wai, a U.K. Border Force officer stationed at Heathrow Airport.

Yuen used the office bank account to fund surveillance operations targeting Hong Kong dissidents and British politicians.

Tracking “Cockroaches”

The espionage activity coincided with Beijing's global extrajudicial campaign known as Operation Fox Hunt, which uses cash bounties to forcibly repatriate individuals wanted by the Chinese state.

Hong Kong authorities had publicized bounties of up to £100,000 for information leading to the capture of specific targets.

Wai utilized his access to Home Office databases to track pro-democracy activists who had sought refuge in Britain, referring to them as "cockroaches" in a group chat.

He also gathered imagery of prominent pro-democracy protester Nathan Law outside the Oxford Union in late 2023.

The operation also targeted British lawmakers critical of the Chinese Communist Party, including Sir Iain Duncan Smith and Baroness Kennedy of the Shaws, both of whom were sanctioned by Beijing in 2021.

Operation Busted by MI5

A central element of the prosecution's case involved the forced entry and surveillance of a West Yorkshire flat belonging to Monica Kwong, an individual accused of fraud by her employer in Hong Kong.

The operation used surveillance plans drawn up on ChatGPT and implausible covers to gain entry.

Unbeknownst to the operatives, the entire deployment was monitored by MI5, which had already moved Kwong to a safe location and bugged the property.

When police arrested Wai, he was carrying both his legitimate warrant card as a special constable and a fraudulent identification card.

A third individual charged in the case, former Royal Marine Matthew Trickett, died by suicide a week after being charged in May 2024.

Both Yuen and Wai had pleaded not guilty, with Yuen claiming his duties were purely administrative.

Diplomatic Fallout

Justice Cheema-Grubb described the defendants' actions as "deliberate, concerted, and serious," noting that modern foreign intelligence activity increasingly targets dissidents protected by U.K. law.

Security Minister Angela Eagle stated the sentences demonstrate that the U.K. will not tolerate hostile activity by foreign states.

Campaigners have called for the closure of the HKETO, arguing its special status is anachronistic following Beijing's imposition of national security laws on Hong Kong in 2020.

The Chinese embassy in London dismissed the convictions as a "political move" designed to smear the Chinese government.