CHINESE DIPLOS ‘SPYING’
Espionage at NYC consulate: Pompeo
China’s New York consulate is being used as a major hub for the communist nation’s US espionage efforts, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told The Post in the wake of an NYPD cop being arrested and charged with spying for the Beijing government.
And it’s likely more diplo- mats and agents will be arrested, Pompeo (inset) said in a sit-down on Wednesday.
“They’re engaged in activities where they’re crossing the line from normal diplomacy to the kinds of things that would be more akin to what spies are doing,” Pom- peo said when pressed on the goings-on inside the consulate on the West Side Highway off 42nd Street.
Pompeo’s remarks follow the arrest last week of an NYPD officer charged with serving as a secret agent for the Chinese government — a charge Beijing has denied — and the US government’s decision to shut down the Chinese consulate in Houston in July after two military workers there were charged with trying to steal COVID-19 vaccine research.
“We closed it because they’re engaged in espionage, and that is a legal term. It’s not just a spy-novel term. It is a very data-driven, analytic, factbased analysis that says, ‘No, this is espionage, it’s unlawful, and, therefore, we’re going to send you back,’ ” Pompeo said while on a flight back from Wisconsin on Wednesday.
During a speech to state lawmakers there, the former CIA director warned that Chinese Communist Party officials were engaged in a fullscale propaganda operation at the state and city levels, and identified the Big Apple consulate as “very politically active.”
“CCP campaigns targeting state-level officials and local interests have been in full swing for years, and they’re increasing in intensity,” Pompeo said.
In February, a Chinese consul based in Chicago reached out to Wisconsin state Sen. Roger Roth, angling for him to pass a resolution praising Beijing’s handling of the coronavirus — a request that Roth called “nuts.”
In July, the State Department confirmed that Chinese consulates in more than two dozen US cities were aiding undercover Communist Party soldiers posing as students to engage in spying.
The Chinese consulate in San Francisco was also identified as hotbeds for espionage.
Diplomats at the facilities have long been accused of trying to steal trade secrets from nearby Silicon Valley or collecting information on the Big Apple’s Uighurs and Chinese dissident groups.
Pompeo told The Post that those efforts could even extend to the United Nations headquarters, and he said the Trump administration was keeping a very close eye on the number of Chinese diplomats working in the United States.
“Remember, not only do we have Chinese consulates here, but there’s a UN facility, too,” the former Kansas congressman said.
“So, if we’re talking about New York, we not only have the Chinese Consulate in New York — that is the bilateral consulate — they also have a large contingent of Chinese diplomats here for United Nations work,” he warned.
Chinese authorities denied charges NYPD Officer and US Army reservist Baimadajie Angwang betrayed fellow Tibetans in New York by spying on them and passing the intelligence on to a Chinese government handler.
When asked if there are other cases such as Angwangs, Pompeo responded: “Absolutely.”
“As you’ve seen, not just the case with the NYPD officer this past week,” he said.
“We’ve seen multiple cases being prosecuted by the Department of Justice, and we’re confident that they will continue to pursue this, and I would expect that there will be more to follow.”
The Chinese Consulate General in New York did not immediately comment.