UK border official among two men found guilty of spying on Hong Kong dissidents in Britain

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - LONDON —A UK border official and a former Hong Kong police officer were convicted Thursday of espionage for China, engaging in what prosecutors described as 'shadow policing' operations in Britain.

Peter Wai, 40, and Bill Yuen, 65, masqueraded as legitimate law enforcement or intelligence personnel to surveil and gather information on Hong Kong dissidents and pro-democracy activists, according to prosecutors.

A jury at the Central Criminal Court in London found them guilty of violating the National Security Act by aiding a foreign intelligence agency. Additionally, Wai was convicted of misconduct in a public office.

The men, both dual Chinese and British nationals, had denied the accusations, while the Chinese embassy in London has accused Britain of fabricating the charges against them.

Wai and Yuen will be sentenced at a later date and face up to 14 years in jail.

The jury at London’s Old Bailey court was unable to reach a verdict on another charge of conducting “foreign interference” by forcing entry on behalf of Hong Kong authorities into the home in northern England of a woman who has been accused of fraud.

Relations between Britain and China have been strained since a national security crackdown on sometimes violent pro-democracy protests in 2019 in Hong Kong, which was under British rule for 156 years before reverting to Chinese sovereignty almost three decades ago.

Following Thursday’s convictions, security minister Dan Jarvis said Britain would continue to hold China to account and challenge them for any actions which put Britons’ safety at risk.

The Chinese ambassador would be summoned “to make it clear activity like this was, and will always be, unacceptable on UK soil,” Jarvis added.

Prosecutor Duncan Atkinson told jurors that Yuen and Wai had been tasked to carry out “shadow policing operations” for the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and ultimately China.

Yuen was a retired Hong Kong police officer who worked at Hong Kong’s Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) in London, while Wai, as well as working for the immigration force was also a volunteer officer for the City of London Police.

Wai was convicted of misusing his Border Force job to search the interior ministry’s computer database and gain access to details of foreign nationals.

Atkinson said the men’s operation involved spying on dissidents resident in Britain, including activist Nathan Law, for whom the Hong Kong government had issued bounties of HK$1 million ($127,700) for information leading to their whereabouts or capture.

Messages between Yuen, Wai and others showed them discussing plans to target activists, who were referred to as “cockroaches,” and carrying out surveillance on British political figures.

“For years, members of the Hong Kong diaspora in the United Kingdom have lived in fear,” Finn Lau, one of the targeted activists, said in a statement. “Today’s conviction confirms that fear was not paranoia. It was real.”

Law, an exiled leader of the Hong Kong student protest, said he was not surprised by the verdict.

The conviction at the Old Bailey of Wai and Yuen for assisting a foreign intelligence service was a sobering first but the details that came out in the nine-week trial mainly served to confirm his suspicions, Law said.

No Chinese spies had been convicted in British criminal history before Thursday.

A third man who was accused of the same offenses as Yuen and Wai was found dead not long after the trio were charged. Matthew Trickett, 37, a former British Royal Marine, had worked as an immigration officer and private investigator. His death was not considered suspicious.

Last November, Britain’s MI5 security service warned lawmakers that Chinese agents were trying to collect information and influence activity at Westminster.

On the day Yuen and Wai’s trial started in March, British police said they had arrested three men on suspicion of assisting China’s foreign intelligence service, including the partner of a sitting lawmaker.

Britain approved in January China’s plans to build Beijing’s largest embassy in Europe in London, leading critics to accuse Starmer of prioritizing economic ties over security risks, although UK security officials said these could be mitigated.