US government quiet as Chinese agents cripple spy operations in Beijing
A lack of resources and coordination particularly between the CIA and FBI exposes vulnerabilities to be exploited, says expert
A US consulate official was plucked off a street by plain clothes security officers last year in Chengdu, interrogated overnight and forced to confess his involvement in acts of treachery, Politico wrote, the latest in a series of similar reports by US media.
Detained by China’s security apparatus because they believed the American to be a CIA officer, he had to be “rescued” and immediately evacuated from China, Politico reported, citing anonymous US national security officers.
Earlier this year, The New York Times reported that the Chinese government killed or imprisoned more than a dozen agents working for the US in China between 2010 and 2012.
Newsweek magazine followed The New York Times report with a piece detailing how, a decade ago, undercover Chinese agents began targeting American workers constructing the US embassy in Beijing by tempting them with sex workers. To this day, CIA employees in the embassy “are afraid to talk above a whisper in their own technologically insulated offices out of fear of bugs”, Newsweek wrote.