Two men, a former British Border Force officer and a Hong Kong trade official, have been convicted in a London court of spying for China by conducting surveillance of Hong Kong dissidents living in Britain.
The nine-week trial, which stemmed from arrests in 2024, had sent a chill through the community of Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners in Britain, and British officials said they hoped the outcome would reassure them that the country was taking the prospect of Chinese interference seriously.
Chi Leung “Peter” Wai, 40, and Chung Biu Yuen, 65, were convicted on Thursday in London’s Central Criminal Court, known as the Old Bailey, of assisting a foreign intelligence service after they were found to be illegally gathering information for the benefit of the authorities in Hong Kong and China. Mr. Wai was also found guilty of misconduct in public office for the misuse of government systems while working as an officer in Britain’s Border Force. Prosecutors said he had used his access to data to identify potential targets for surveillance.
The two men will be sentenced at a later date. The jury could not reach a verdict on separate charges against both men of foreign interference.
Helen Flanagan, head of Counter Terrorism Policing in London, which led the investigation, called the men’s activity “both sinister and chilling.”
“It is completely unacceptable for anyone to carry out this kind of activity on behalf of a foreign state here in the U.K.,” she said. “I hope this outcome provides reassurance to those living in the U.K. who may be concerned about being targeted by any foreign state, that we will do everything we can to help keep them safe.”
A third man, Matthew Trickett, was also charged at the time. But after he was released on bail, Mr. Trickett was found dead in a park in Maidenhead, a town west of London, in May 2024. An inquest into his death was expected to take place after these criminal proceedings.
Hong Kong, once a British colony, was returned to Chinese control in 1997, with Beijing agreeing to preserve the territory’s “lifestyle” for 50 years under a “one country, two systems” formula. But as rights were eroded, large-scale pro-democracy protests gripped Hong Kong beginning in 2019.
They were soon quashed by Beijing, which imposed a national security law in 2020, and China has since gone on to tamp down on any form of dissent in Hong Kong. The increased repression prompted many of the city’s pro-democracy protesters to flock to Britain. Some have claimed asylum, while others have been able to benefit from a visa program that gives British overseas passport holders in Hong Kong a path to citizenship in Britain.
The initial arrest of the three men was linked to an attempt by Mr. Wai and Mr. Trickett in May 2024 to enter a property that belonged to a woman who had fled Hong Kong and moved to Britain in 2023, according to prosecutors. They said her former employer had accused her of fraud, which she denied. Mr. Wai, Mr. Trickett, the former boss and two former Hong Kong police officers were among a group of people that had traveled to her flat to try to locate her. They had tried to get her to open the door by pretending to be maintenance workers, prosecutors said.
Another group then tried to get in the next day, but Counter Terrorism Police officers were soon at the scene and arrested them, the police said.
Mr. Yuen had been keeping in contact with the group from London, the prosecutors said, and investigators eventually pieced together a coordinated effort among the men to carry out surveillance on behalf of the Hong Kong authorities.
Mr. Yuen, who was head of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in London, was in contact with people linked to the Hong Kong authorities, and was then instructing Mr. Wai to spy on U.K.-based pro-democracy campaigners, prosecutors said. While Mr. Wai said he was carrying out private security work, evidence from Mr. Trickett’s phone showed that both men knew the significance of the people they were targeting and their links to Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigns. Evidence also showed that Mr. Yeun was making payments to the pair, prosecutors said.
