British prosecutors dropped a high-profile probe into a parliamentary aide and a teacher over a lack of evidence
Senior UK security officials will face a probe over the collapse of a high-profile case in which two men, one of whom was a British parliamentary researcher, were accused of spying for China, according to Bloomberg on Tuesday, citing an anonymous source.
Christopher Cash and financial analyst Christopher Berry were charged with sharing “prejudicial information” with Beijing in April last year. The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) dropped the charges against the two men just weeks before trial, citing “evidential standards.”
The decision has sparked outrage among MPs, who expect to grill officials on the collapse of the case at an upcoming parliamentary committee meeting.
Reports in the UK media have suggested the case was axed to avoid souring relations with Beijing, one of London’s biggest trade partners.
UK Director of Public Prosecutions Stephen Parkinson, the case was dropped because London refused to brand China a threat, Sky News has reported.
None of the witness statements provided said that China “represented a threat to national security,” and by August of this year, the prosecution realized that “this evidence would not be forthcoming,” he wrote in a letter to MPs on Tuesday.
Parkinson cited a case from earlier this year in which the CPS convicted six Bulgarian nationals of feeding information to Russia, which was ruled to be an ‘enemy’ for the purposes of the Official Secrets Act.
Moscow denied the spying allegations at the time, accusing London of trying to stir up anti-Russian hysteria.
The UK government has said it is not to blame for torpedoing the investigation, adding that it was a decision made by prosecutors who relied on language used by the previous government in its China policy.
London has recently moved to rebuild trade ties with Beijing, resuming Joint Economic and Trade Commission talks last month after a seven-year freeze.
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