Australia\u2019s domestic spy agency is investigating whether China tried to install an agent in federal parliament in what Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Monday called \u201cdeeply disturbing\u201d allegations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation said it had launched an investigation before the alleged plot was reported by Australia\u2019s \u201c60 Minutes\u201d programme and affiliated newspapers on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe reporting on Nine\u2019s \u201860 Minutes\u2019 contains allegations that ASIO takes seriously,\u201d ASIO Director-General of Security Mike Burgess said in the statement on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAustralians can be reassured that ASIO was previously aware of matters that have been reported today, and has been actively investigating them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Resource-rich Australia\u2019s ties with its most important trading partner China have deteriorated in recent years, amid accusations that Beijing is meddling in domestic affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The government has set up a counter-foreign interference coordinator and given the intelligence and security agencies additional resources to protect Australians and the nation\u2019s institutions, a government spokesman said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Car dealer Zhao told ASIO about the alleged approach from another Melbourne businessman about a year ago, the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper said in the joint report with \u201c60 Minutes\u201d and The Age newspaper, citing Zhao\u2019s associates and Western security sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHostile foreign intelligence activity continues to pose a real threat to our nation and its security. ASIO will continue to confront and counter foreign interference and espionage in Australia,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The latest allegations came a day after media reported that a Chinese defector, who said he was an intelligence operative, told ASIO how China had funded and conducted political interference in Taiwan, Australia and Hong Kong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Responding to the media reports, Chinese police said the \u201cso-called China spy\u201d was a 26-year-old convicted fraudster from the eastern province of Fujian.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Australia\u2019s domestic spy agency is investigating whether China tried to install an agent in federal parliament in what Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Monday called \u201cdeeply disturbing\u201d allegations. The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation said it had launched an investigation before the alleged plot was reported by Australia\u2019s \u201c60 Minutes\u201d programme and affiliated newspapers on Sunday. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75165,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75164"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75164\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75166,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75164\/revisions\/75166"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}