Ex-researcher sentenced to death for spying, Beijing says

A former engineer at a Chinese research institute has been sentenced to death for selling classified material to foreign spy agencies, Chinese authorities said.

After he resigned from the institute, the researcher, identified by his surname Liu, came up with a “carefully designed” plan to sell intelligence to foreign agencies, according to an article published on Wednesday by China’s Ministry of State Security.

The ministry did not name Liu’s former employer or the foreign groups that allegedly bought his material.

The announcement comes amid increasing warnings from China that its citizens are being co-opted by foreign entities to serve as spies.

“Desperadoes who want to take shortcuts to heaven will all suffer consequences,” the ministry said in Wednesday’s article.

Believing that he had been treated unfairly at the institute, Liu saved a large amount of classified material before he left, intending to use it for revenge and blackmail, the ministry stated.

He then joined an investment firm and, after failed investments drove him into debt, approached a foreign spy agency which got the material from him at a “very low price”, according to the ministry.

This agency subsequently cut off contact with Liu, the ministry added, and he tried to sell the information abroad.

“In half a year, he secretly travelled to many countries and seriously leaked our country’s secrets,” the article said.

Liu, who confessed after being arrested, has been stripped of political rights for life.

Beijing has been increasingly wary of espionage, and warned that its citizens are being recruited by foreign spy agencies trying to secure Chinese state secrets.

Last November, a former employee at a Chinese state agency was handed the death sentence after his USB work flash drive was allegedly seized by foreign spies and he became their “puppet”, according to Chinese authorities.

In February last year, Australian writer Yang Hengjun, known for blogging about human rights issues in China, was handed a suspended death sentence on espionage charges. That sentence was upheld, and Yang remains behind bars in China, despite Australian leaders calling for his release.

Concerns about Chinese influence and infiltration operations are also brewing among governments across the world, several of which have in recent years stepped up arrests of Chinese nationals on espionage charges.