China says that 3 plots of frusted foreign spies, including the “honey trap” that depended on the foreign agent

Beijing – China said Thursday that it had deciphered three espionage plots, including one in which a public servant was attracted to the “seductive beauty” of a foreign agent, urging government workers to remain attentive to threats abroad.

Beijing has intensified espionage warnings in recent years, since relations with the United States and other Western nations have worsened. His Ministry of State Security (MSS) said Thursday that foreign spies “have been increasingly active in the infiltration and theft of China Secrets” and were attacked to public officials.

“Individual officials have caused the harmful effects of escape secrets due to the lack of beliefs, a weakened sense of discipline and a loosening awareness of the rules … damaging national security and interests,” said the MSS.

Described a case in which a provincial government employee surnamed Li fell into a “meticulously designed Honey trap“While traveling abroad to work.

“Unable to resist the seductive beauty of the foreign intelligence agent,” Li was blackmailed with “intimate photos” and forced to deliver official documents once in China.

He was sentenced to five years in prison for espionage, according to the statement.

Another case involved a municipal worker identified as Hou, whom the MSS said he had secretly photographed confidential documents and sold them to foreign espionage agencies to recover the lost savings of an addiction to the game. Later, Hou was retained “criminally responsible,” said the ministry, without specifying his punishment.

The Ministry also detailed a third case in which a young high -flight official lost his job after allegedly sharing confidential information with a relative who photographed and sent it to espionage agencies abroad.

“Leaks are often hidden in the small details of our working life,” said the ministry. “If our ideals and beliefs are not strong … eventually they can fall into the criminal abyss designed by foreign espionage agencies.”

China’s espionage agency did not appoint countries that were supposedly behind the plots. When asked what countries were involved, during a regular information session on Thursday, the spokeswoman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, MAO NO, said “was not familiar with this problem.”

Beijing and Washington have long negotiated accusations of espionage, which is punished with death in China.

Last month, Beijing accused the central intelligence agency of an “absurd” attempt to recruit Chinese citizens through “amateur” videos published on social networks. In April, Chinese security officials said they had involved three “secret agents” of the United States in cyber attacks during the Asian Winter Games in February in the Northeast City of Harbin.

The Ministry of State Security also said in March that a former engineer had sentenced to death to filter state secrets to a foreign power.

American officials say that China uses the same tactics to attack Americans and other nationals, and their own citizens abroad.

In May, Reported 60 minutes That MSS has become the world’s largest and most active espionage agency, and that its main objective is not foreign powers, but China’s own people, including those living in the United States.

The former American diplomat Jim Lewis, who has more than 30 years of direct experience with China’s intelligence agencies, told 60 minutes that Chinese citizens in foreign soil “could be learning something that Xi does not want them to learn. And so, they are seen as a risk, not as a threat, but as a risk.”

But Lewis said the MSS also addresses foreign citizens with the same tactics as other espionage agencies, namely sex, money and revenge. He said that honey trap or “Honeypot” strategy was common, but that monetary incentive was also a reliable option to recruit foreign agents.

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