A spy for the Communist Chinese is suspected of having infiltrated a meeting of British lawmakers and exiled Hong Kong dissidents in the House of Commons earlier this month.
At an invite-only meeting in a top-floor parliamentary committee room on July 5th hosted by Conservative MP Bob Seely, an unnamed man apparently entered the typically secured area posing as a tourist.
The meeting, which was open to over 200 invited MPs and peers, journalists, and Hong Kong dissidents — some of whom covered their faces out of safety concerns — was intended to discuss the current situation in the former British colony, according to the Daily Mail.
The infiltrator refused to identify himself or the organisation he represented when pressed, while claiming that he was a tourist who was led to the room by an official tour group, despite that the area being described as not being on a tour route.
Ultimately he left after being confronted, however, those inside the room believed that he was, in reality, an agent of the communist regime in Beijing sent to intimidate the Hong Kong activists present, some of whom have had £100,000 arrest bounties placed on their heads by the CCP-controlled Hong Kong police.
LONDON, ENGLAND – JUNE 12: Activist Finn Lau speaks at a rally for Hong Kong democracy at the Marble Arch on June 12, 2021 in London, England. (Photo by Laurel Chor/Getty Images)
One such activist, Finn Lau, the founder of Stand with Hong Kong and Hong Kong Liberty, who fled his home city to Britain after being arrested at a protest in 2020, said: “I believe this man was a CCP informer. This is one of the remotest committee rooms in Parliament. And it is on the top floor. It is not a coincidence that a random Chinese tourist was outside the room at the exact right time and was attempting to access the event.
“The incident is just the latest example of CCP harassment Hong Kongers like me have faced. But I will not be deterred and I will continue to advocate for democracy in Hong Kong.”
The organiser of the meeting, Tory MP Bob Seely, a member of the foreign affairs committee in the Commons, said: “If this was a Chinese Communist Party spy then it is yet another example of this regime’s cack-handed malign incompetence.
“It would be completely inappropriate for Beijing to send an operative to intimidate or record people inside a private parliamentary event.”
The former leader of the Conservative Party and the founder of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, Sir Iain Duncan Smith added: “The Government must act on this – it is astonishing.’
Sir Iain, who was personally sanctioned by the communist country for highlighting the persecution of the Uyghur Muslim minority in China, continued: “We need to be sure that anyone acting suspiciously or refusing to identify themselves in Parliament is removed immediately.
“The CCP is a deeply unreliable and nasty organisation doing its level best to undermine security and free speech here in the UK.”
It is not the first time that pro-democracy activists have been harrassed on British soil, with former UK consulate employee Simon Cheng — who was subjected to detention and torture after being kidnapped on the Chinese mainland over his alleged role in the Hong Kong freedom movement — said last year that he believes Chinese agents are actively tracking his movements in the UK. Cheng, among others, was listed on a £10,000 bounty list sent out on a Chinese nationalist WeChat group in 2021 seeking information on dissidents in Britain.
The latest incident comes just days after Hong Kong national security police, an arm of the CCP, raided the family home of exiled activist Nathan Law, a veteran of the Umbrella Movement. Law’s parents and brother were reportedly taken into custody and questioned by police, although they were ultimately released, the Hong Kong Free Press reported.
Law, who is living in exile in Britain, is also among those to have had an arrest bounty of £100,000 put on his head by the Hong Kong authorities. Last week, Secretary for Security Chris Tang declared that the police force would spend “a lifetime’s endeavour to catch the wanted” while personally branding Law a “Chinese traitor” who had engaged in “evil acts.”