When a suspected Chinese spy was extradited to the US last year, the US Department of Justice praised the “significant assistance” given by authorities in Belgium.
Xu Yanjun was arrested in Belgium after going there to meet a contact “for the purpose of discussing and receiving the sensitive information he had requested,” the US indictment said.
Xu was charged with attempting to commit economic espionage, with GE Aviation the main target. The case is pending.
Illustration: Yusha
Belgium might seem an unlikely destination for a Chinese agent, but it is a den of spies, the Belgian State Security Service (VSSE) says. It says the number of operatives is at least as high as during the Cold War and Brussels is their “chessboard.”
Host to the EU’s institutions and NATO headquarters, Belgium is an alluring draw card for aspiring espionage-makers. Diplomats, lawmakers and military officials mingle, sharing gossip and ideas, while Belgium’s strategic location makes it important to China in its own right as a place to exert its influence in Europe.
“The mere fact that we hold international institutions such as NATO and the EU makes Belgium a natural focus for China,” Brussels-based Egmont Royal Institute for International Relations research fellow Bruno Hellendorff said. “It’s common knowledge that there are many spies in Brussels, and these days espionage from China is a major and growing concern.”
German newspaper Die Welt in February cited an unpublished assessment by the EU’s European External Action Service that about 250 Chinese spies were working in Brussels — more than from Russia.
The Chinese Mission to the EU said that it was “deeply shocked” at the “unfounded” reports.
“China respects the sovereignty of all countries and does not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries,” it said.
Yet the incidents keep coming.
A Chinese director of the Confucius Institute at VUB Brussels University was in October barred from entering the EU Schengen area for eight years after being accused of espionage, a charge he denies.
An insight into the methods employed by China are outlined in the Xu indictment. His duties allegedly included obtaining trade secrets from aviation and aerospace companies in the US, “and throughout Europe.”
He used aliases and invited experts on paid trips to China to deliver presentations at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, operated by the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. He ensured targets carried a work computer whose data could be captured.
The US remains at the core of Beijing’s espionage activities — the head of the FBI in July said that China was trying to “steal their way up the economic ladder at our expense.”
Yet Europe appears increasingly in focus, with cases of so-called interference by China identified in Poland, France, Germany and the UK.
“The Chinese are becoming far more active than they were 10 or 20 years ago,” said former British diplomat Charles Parton, who has more than two decades of experience of China.
Espionage is “the far end of the spectrum” of interference that ranges from academia to “technological spillover” — collecting data to send back to China for mining, London-based Royal United Services Institute senior associate fellow Parton said.
Belgium’s elite generally has a relaxed attitude toward China that can open it to charges of complacency. A fractured political system makes it harder to craft a unified strategy — there is still no government six months after elections.
A delegation to China this month included four ministers responsible for trade relations — a federal minister plus one each for Dutch-speaking Flanders, Francophone Wallonia and Brussels.
Even as the EU adopts a more skeptical stance toward China — losing its naivety, as one senior European official put it — Belgium is opening the gates to Chinese investments in strategic areas from energy to shipping and technology.
Belgium is responding to China’s rise “in a pragmatic way,” stressing its advantages in areas such as logistics, while ensuring “attention to the sustainability of the projects and respect for international standards,” the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
“They [Belgium] have very advanced technologies that China needs,” said Renmin University Institute of International Affairs director Wang Yiwei (王義桅), a former Chinese diplomat based in Brussels. “Through Brussels you can access Europe and even the United States.”
He said that Chinese innovation is fast catching up with the US and talk of industrial espionage is exaggerated.
All nations make efforts to win over hearts and minds, and much influence-building is legitimate diplomatic activity, but there is also a gray zone and it can be “difficult to tell the hand of the Chinese state from a much more diffuse web of influence-peddling,” the European Council on Foreign Relations said in a 2017 report.
Brecht Vermeulen, chairman of the Belgian parliament’s home affairs committee until losing his seat this year, joined parliament’s China friendship group soon after his election in 2014 as a lawmaker for the Flemish nationalist N-VA party, the largest group in the then-ruling coalition.
Over the course of his five-year term, Vermeulen made several trips to China, where officials briefed him on technological advances in artificial intelligence, facial recognition and cybersecurity.
During that time, N-VA policy evolved from sympathizing with efforts by some in Taiwan and Hong Kong to keep a distance from China, toward what Vermeulen called “Realpolitik.”
“I think we must open more doors to the Chinese and see how they react,” Vermeulen said in an interview in Ghent. “If they open their doors, too, then it’s good on both sides. Of course, we are a small country and China is enormous, but if we act in one way and there’s a reaction in the same way, then OK, we can proceed, step by step.”
Still, there are signs that the Belgian authorities are attuned to potential threats.
State Grid Corp of China, which has more employees than Brussels has inhabitants, in 2016 bid for a stake in energy company Eandis. A last-minute leak of a VSSE dossier urged “extreme caution,” citing the risk that Belgian technology could be used by the Chinese military, and a planned vote on the bid never took place.
Engaging with China’s influence apparatus is not without risks.
Filip Dewinter, a regional lawmaker with the far-right Vlaams Belang party, was investigated over his ties to an organization suspected of spying for China. The probe was dropped after it was found Dewinter had committed no crime.
“Maybe I had too much faith in these people,” De Morgen cited Dewinter as saying in February, adding that he was now “more informed” about Chinese espionage and the need “to be careful.”
However, while there is now “some strategic thinking” on China in Belgium, the institutional setup means it is not across the board, Hellendorff said.
He sees “little to no dialogue between regions on the implications of growing Chinese investment in the country, not only in economic terms, but also in terms of its impact on values and influence.”
That lack of coordination between regions and layers of government allows Antwerp Mayor Bart de Wever to play an outsize role in ties with Beijing. Antwerp is home to Europe’s second-largest port and has a direct rail link to China.
Wang thinks bilateral relations are developing well.
“In Europe there’s a saying that small is beautiful,” Wang said. “Belgium is beautiful in the Chinese understanding.”
The 75th anniversary summit of NATO was held in Washington from Tuesday to Thursday last week. Its main focus was the reinvigoration and revitalization of NATO, along with its expansion. The shadow of domestic electoral politics could not be avoided. The focus was on whether US President Biden would deliver his speech at the NATO summit cogently. Biden’s fitness to run in the next US presidential election in November was under assessment. NATO is acquiring more coherence and teeth. These were perhaps more evident than Biden’s future. The link to the Biden candidacy is critical for NATO. If Biden loses
Shortly after Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) stepped down as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 2012, his successor, Xi Jinping (習近平), articulated the “Chinese Dream,” which aims to rejuvenate the nation and restore its historical glory. While defense analysts and media often focus on China’s potential conflict with Taiwan, achieving “rejuvenation” would require Beijing to engage in at least six different conflicts with at least eight countries. These include territories ranging from the South China Sea and East China Sea to Inner Asia, the Himalayas and lands lost to Russia. Conflicts would involve Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia,
The Sino-Indian border dispute remains one of the most complex and enduring border issues in the world. Unlike China’s borders with Russia and Vietnam, which have seen conflicts, but eventually led to settled agreements, the border with India, particularly the region of Arunachal Pradesh, remains a point of contention. This op-ed explores the historical and geopolitical nuances that contribute to this unresolved border dispute. The crux of the Sino-Indian border dispute lies in the differing interpretations of historical boundaries. The McMahon Line, established by the 1914 Simla Convention, was accepted by British India and Tibet, but never recognized by China, which
In a recent interview with the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily, former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) called President William Lai (賴清德) “naive.” As always with Ma, one must first deconstruct what he is saying to fully understand the parallel universe he insists on defending. Who is being “naive,” Lai or Ma? The quickest way is to confront Ma with a series of pointed questions that force him to take clear stands on the complex issues involved and prevent him from his usual ramblings. Regarding China and Taiwan, the media should first begin with questions like these: “Did the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)