A New York man and United States citizen has been arrested for working as a spy for the Chinese government, according to the Department of Justice.
Yuanjun Tang, 67, was arrested in Queens, New York, for making false statements to the FBI while acting as an agent for the People’s Republic of China.
Tang, according to a DOJ news release, was once an imprisoned dissident in the PRC for opposing the Chinese Communist Party.
After defecting to Taiwan in 2002, Tang was granted political asylum in the United States.
Tang repaid the favor by acting as an agent of the PRC "by completing tasks at the direction of the PRC’s Ministry of State Security," according to the release. "The MSS is responsible for, among other things, the PRC’s foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, espionage, and political security functions."
Tang reported to an MSS intelligence official through email, encrypted chats, text messages, and audio and video calls. He was instructed by the official to spy on prominent U.S.-based Chinese democracy activists and dissidents.
According to reports, he traveled at least three times for in-person meetings with the intelligence official and helped the organization "infiltrate a group chat on an encrypted messaging application used by numerous PRC dissidents and pro-democracy activists to communicate about pro-democracy issues and express criticism of the PRC government."
Tang lied to the FBI when asked about the correspondences, saying he was no longer able to access an email account he used to communicate.
"Tang is charged with one count of conspiring to act as an agent of a foreign government without notifying the Attorney General, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison; one count of acting as an agent of a foreign government without notifying the Attorney General, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison; and one count of making false statements, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison," the release said.
Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams for the Southern District of New York, and Executive Assistant Director Robert Wells of the FBI’s National Security Branch made the announcement.
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