Cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/43526405
British prosecutors suspected that China’s fifth most senior official was in receipt of intelligence from Westminster in a controversial and now-abandoned espionage case, the Guardian understands.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said in April 2024 that a “senior member of the Chinese Communist party and a politburo member” had received “politically sensitive information” from two British researchers who were charged with spying for China.
That person is understood to be Cai Qi, a member of the standing committee of the CCP politburo. The committee is the ruling body of the CCP and is headed by Xi Jinping, China’s all-powerful leader.
Cai, a Xi protege, is the fifth-ranking member of the seven-man committee, making him one of the most powerful men in China. A former party secretary for Beijing, Cai is also a director of the CCP’s general office, making him de facto chief of staff to Xi.
Last month the CPS dropped the charges against Christopher Berry and Christopher Cash, citing a lack of evidence.
[…]
Labour secretly sabotaged China spy trial: Ministers’ decision not to describe Xi’s regime in court as an ‘enemy’ led the case to collapse
Prosecutors dropped charges last month against Christopher Cash, 30, and Christopher Berry, 33, who were accused of passing information about the Government’s foreign policy to a high-ranking member of the Chinese government.
At the time, Sir Keir Starmer’s spokesman said that it was “extremely disappointing” that the two men would not face trial [but] the case collapsed because ministers withdrew a star witness who had been tasked with testifying that China was an “enemy” of the UK.
Under the Official Secrets Act 1911, Mr Cash and Mr Berry were accused of collecting and passing information that would be “directly or indirectly useful to an enemy”.
Prof Kerry Brown, the director of the Lau China Institute at King’s College London, said an official of Cai’s level having a line of contact with a foreigner, even in cases of intelligence gathering, was “very, very, very unlikely”.
Members of the politburo “really aren’t accessible”, Brown said. “Particularly under Xi Jinping, [they] don’t really have any liberty to do anything too entrepreneurial.” skip past newsletter promotion
Brown said the case “raises questions about how British security services assess information in China”.
I find this story to be the most likely. Even I don’t have time to talk to two random foreigners about gossip