Shock waves are rippling through London's political circles after charges were dropped against two British citizens arrested in the United Kingdom on suspicion of espionage linked to China. When the suspects were released on the grounds that the espionage law could not be applied because China is not legally designated as an "enemy," the ruling and opposition parties scrambled to pin the blame on each other.
According to foreign media including The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) on Oct. 16 local time, two suspects accused of carrying out China-linked espionage in the United Kingdom were released for lack of sufficient grounds for indictment, fueling ongoing clashes in politics. The suspects are former parliamentary aide Christopher Cash, a British national, and teacher Christopher Berry, who are accused of passing internal information from the U.K. Parliament to the Chinese government.
The case dates back to 2022, when Christopher Berry, then working as a teacher in China, first made contact in Hangzhou with Cai Qi, the first secretary of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of China. Cai, fifth in the state hierarchy, is considered one of President Xi Jinping's closest aides. Berry then, under the direction of a Chinese intelligence figure who operated under the code name "Alex," recruited Cash and siphoned off internal secrets of the U.K. Parliament, and was eventually arrested the following year by British prosecutors on espionage charges.
Among the information Cash handed over were the list and photos of a delegation from Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense that visited the United Kingdom in 2022, and records of reviews of Chinese corporations' acquisitions of semiconductor plants.
The trial was blocked by an unexpected legal loophole: under U.K. law, espionage applies only to those who provide useful information to an "enemy." The British government has not officially designated China as a "national security threat and enemy," meaning it cannot be definitively stated that the defendants "provided useful information to an enemy."
As a result, prosecutors withdrew the charges on Oct. 7, and the political sphere immediately launched a blame game. The Conservative Party assailed that "the Labor Party government intentionally abandoned the trial to strengthen trade ties with China," while Prime Minister Keir Starmer countered that "the previous Conservative government failed to designate China as a security threat, which is why the trial collapsed." Matthew Collins, the United Kingdom's deputy national security adviser, said immediately after the cancellation, "China is the greatest state-based threat to the United Kingdom's economic security."
Calls to raise the level of vigilance toward China have continued in recent days. MI5 Director General Ken McCallum said, "As recently as last week, we disrupted another Chinese spying operation," adding, "The United Kingdom should seize opportunities that align with the national interest in relations with China but respond firmly to threats."
On Oct. 13, MI5 went so far as to issue a rare public warning to members of Parliament that "Chinese, Russian, and Iranian spies are approaching politicians with the aim of undermining national democracy." The U.K. Parliament's Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) also said, "The scale of China's intelligence-gathering is beyond anything the United Kingdom has experienced," and that it is taking various forms "from cyberattacks to information demands targeting academia and corporations."
Even after the case, the British government has been working to maintain ties by resuming trade talks with China, citing economic stagnation. Last month, the two countries held high-level trade consultations for the first time in seven years, prompting criticism in political circles that "the government is taking a complacent stance by prioritizing the economy over security."
Some also say the case reflects a combination of diplomatic burdens and government management errors. Nigel Inkster, former director of operations at MI6, the foreign intelligence agency, said, "This case is the outcome of a textbook administrative muddle," adding, "The British government's belated response appears to have produced an absurd situation."