The day I was tapped up by Chinese intelligence

Nigel Inkster, a former director of MI6, has described China as an ‘intelligence state’. This was true even before the Chinese Communist party (CCP) passed laws that all individuals and organisations must help the security forces when asked. Chinese officials, party members and citizens have long been active across a broad front in advancing the interests of the CCP, seeking out political, military, scientific, technological and commercial information. Britain has to be wary of more than just the Ministry of State Security (MSS) — China’s secret police agency — or the military intelligence department. The revelation last month that the Labour MP and former shadow minister Barry Gardiner had accepted £420,000 from Christine Lee, a CCP ‘agent of influence’, was not an isolated occurrence.

We should not make the mistake, as one newspaper did last month, of thinking that ‘China today is not really interested in old-fashioned spying’. Its intelligence services are highly active and use many different methods for recruitment.