(Washington) The US Secretary of Justice on Monday accused the Chinese state of seeking to “undermine the judicial system” of the United States, announcing indictments against 13 Chinese nationals who would work for Beijing intelligence.
Posted at 3:02 p.m.
Updated at 4:37 p.m.
Merrick Garland detailed three separate cases in which alleged Chinese intelligence agents harassed a fellow countryman in the United States, tried to interfere in the prosecution of a major Chinese telecommunications company (it would be the giant Huawei) and pressured American researchers to work for China.
These cases show that “the Chinese state has sought to interfere with the rights and freedoms of people in the United States and to undermine our legal system that protects those rights,” Garland said at a press conference.
“The Department of Justice will not tolerate any attempt by any foreign power to undermine the rule of law on which our democracy is founded,” he added.
These announcements come the day after the reappointment of Chinese President Xi Jinping as head of the Chinese Communist Party and China.
Among the cases cited by Mr. Garland is one involving seven Chinese nationals accused of trying to force a compatriot residing in the United States to return to China as part of a Beijing-led forced repatriation campaign. .
They would have watched and harassed this Chinese national, presented by American justice under the fictitious identity of John Doe-1 to protect his anonymity, and his family within the framework of the operation “Fox Hunt”, which involves “brigades repatriation schemes” seeking to force expatriates to return to China.
Beijing presents this operation as a strategy to fight against corruption, ensuring that its services respect international laws when traveling abroad.
Two of the defendants were arrested Thursday in New York.
Double agent
In a second case, two alleged Chinese intelligence agents have been indicted for trying to obstruct US lawsuits against a Chinese telecom company, likely Huawei.
These two people are said to have hatched a plan to “steal documents and other information” from the prosecution, including paying “a bribe of $41,000 in bitcoin to a US government employee”. The alleged agents thought they had recruited the latter for the benefit of China, but he was in fact a double agent working for the FBI, according to American authorities.
And in the third case, four Chinese nationals were charged “in connection with a long-running intelligence campaign targeting individuals in the United States to act as agents of the People’s Republic of China.”
From 2008 to 2018, these four people would have notably approached university professors and a former federal agent, according to the American authorities.
Asked during Monday’s press conference about the timing of the announcements, the day after a historic third coronation for Xi Jinping, FBI Director Christopher Wray said the cases were presented “when they [étaient] ready”.
“If the Chinese government, the Chinese Communist Party continue to violate our laws, they will continue to fall on the FBI,” he said.