China spy case: Edinburgh's Christopher Cash accused of giving information to Chinese agent for around a year
China was carrying out "large scale espionage" against the UK, witness statements have said
The two men alleged to have spied for China were accused of giving politically sensitive information to a Chinese intelligence agent over the course of around a year.
Former parliamentary researcher Christopher Cash and his friend Christopher Berry both denied passing secrets to China before the case was dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in September.
The case against the pair had alleged that information about the inner workings of the British political system and the government’s position on Chinese businesses were passed to the agent, which was then handed to a senior member of the Chinese Communist Party and a Politburo member.
Deputy national security adviser Matt Collins, whose witness statements were published on Wednesday, said sensitive information relating to the personal and political activities of MPs was also allegedly passed between the two men.
These included Jeremy Hunt being likely to pull out of the Conservative Party leadership race and Tom Tugendhat being “almost certain” to get a cabinet position from then-prime minister Rishi Sunak in exchange for support on foreign policy matters.
Mr Collins said a meeting between Mr Berry and a senior Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader in July 2022 was “highly unlikely” to have happened “unless the Chinese state considered him to be someone who could obtain valuable information”.
At the time of his arrest, Mr Cash was director at the China Research Group (CRG) – a group set up to formulate ideas on how to respond to the country’s rise.
Mr Collins said Mr Cash was made aware “in detail” of the July 2022 meeting, with the researcher allegedly sending Mr Berry a message that read: “You’re in spy territory now.”
The CPS’s case was Mr Cash and Mr Berry became friends from as early as August 2017 when they were both teaching in the Hangzhou area of China.
During the time period the pair were alleged to have been spying, Mr Berry and the Chinese intelligence agent were based in China and Mr Cash was based in the UK.
The CPS alleged the intelligence agent commissioned at least 34 reports from Mr Berry, which included information obtained from Mr Cash following the agent’s requests for reports on specific topics.
READ MORE: Why the China spy case is undermining Sir Keir Starmer's one true strength linked to Donald Trump
Prosecutors alleged Mr Cash eventually began to share unsolicited “off-the-record” information, but most of the information from him was solicited by Mr Berry.
Mr Collins provided witness statements to the CPS, in which he called China “the biggest state-based threat to the UK’s economic security”.
The deputy national security adviser said “by its very nature”, the alleged sharing of information between Mr Berry, Mr Cash and the intelligence agent was “prejudicial to the safety or interests of the UK”.
He said Mr Cash’s alleged involvement would have provided the intelligence agent access to the CRG, the parliamentary estate and at least two senior MPs – the then-chair of the foreign affairs select committee Alicia Kearns and her predecessor Mr Tugendhat.
Mr Collins’s witness statement said the alleged information-sharing system “emboldens the Chinese state to believe that it is possible to successfully penetrate the UK’s institutions and may encourage them to make further efforts to do so”.
After the CPS dropped the case, the director of public prosecutions (DPP) Stephen Parkinson said the evidence needed to show that China represented a threat to national security when the alleged offences took place.
He said there was an “ongoing obligation” to independently assess the evidence of a case, stressing that while he stood by the decision to bring charges in April last year, a High Court decision weeks later meant the threshold for the evidence had changed.
Comments
Want to join the conversation? Please or to comment on this article.