Party insiders in the ranks: communists infiltrate Western consulates(Part1)
The leak of the Communist Party membership database shows how the system under President Xi Jinping operates — by setting up branches inside companies and government agencies. Picture: Getty Images
By SHARRI MARKSON
The Chinese Communist Party has infiltrated the Australian, British and US consulates in Shanghai, with a government-run recruitment agency placing advisers into Western embassies for more than a decade.
A leak of official membership records — the first in the world — has exposed details of 1.95 million CCP members, including their position, birthdate and ethnicity, after being extracted from a Shanghai server by whistleblowers.
An investigation by The Australian has found that at least 10 consulates in Shanghai have CCP members employed as senior political and government affairs specialists, clerks, economic advisers and executive assistants.
Foreign affairs experts warn the employment of CCP members in the consulates, some for up to 16 years, could be part of a “state-sponsored spy ring”, while intelligence officers labelled it a breach of protocol and a risk to national security.
The database has also revealed CCP members working in global companies such as Boeing — which has billions of dollars in defence contracts — inside Pfizer and AstraZeneca, pharmaceutical companies which are developing coronavirus vaccines, and at Western universities.
Even ANZ has at least one CCP branch — with 23 members — in its Chinese operations. An ANZ spokesman said the bank did not interfere with its employees’ involvement in political groups. While there is no evidence that anyone on the party membership list has spied for the Chinese government — and many become members to boost their career prospects — the new revelations have raised concerns about what safeguards are in place at consulates and major corporations. But CCP members, of which there are 92 million, must pledge an oath that puts the party’s interests above all and “be ready at all times to sacrifice my all for the party”.
READ MORE:Millions in the party, with fringe benefits for all
Thirty British MPs, including former Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith, will soon table an urgent question about the issue in the House of Commons.
Coffe, tea or CCP? - 0
The database shows CCP members have been or are currently employed in Australian, US, British, German, Swiss, Indian, New Zealand, Italian and South African missions in Shanghai.
An investigation by The Australian has uncovered how the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade directly hires local staff through a Chinese government agency, the Shanghai Foreign Agency Service Department.
According to the database, the SFASD has at least 12 active CCP branches with 249 members.
DFAT has been hiring staff through the SFASD for at least five years, with the most recent advertisement for an Australian consulate-general public diplomacy, research and visits officer placed on the agency’s website in September, offering an annual base salary of 160,840 yuan ($32,526).
Australian job advertisements indicate that hires of local Chinese nationals all need to go through the SFASD.
A 2016 job placement advert for a consulate “research, visits and public diplomacy manager”, which “reports to the deputy consul general” stated: “The successful applicant will need to meet the requirements of, and be employed through the Shanghai Foreign Agency Service Department.”
SFASD’S website currently lists job vacancies for the Australian, US, Czech, Ethiopian, Brazilian, Chilean and Hong Kong consulates in Shanghai from July 2020.
A senior executive assistant who worked for the Australian consulate in Shanghai, and has been involved in organising parliamentary delegations, is listed on the database as a CCP member. The Australian has chosen not to publish the assistant’s name but sent DFAT questions about the
security clearance undertaken.
A spokesman said: “DFAT is used to operating within different overseas contexts … Our recruitment, security and risk-management processes are robust.”
https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/party-insiders-in-the-ranks-communists-infiltrate-western-consulates/news-story/f49ab7049d3ede3752589e0aaba9b783