Unlock Editor Digest for free
Rawla Khalaf, editor of the FT, selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
The alleged Chinese spy linked to Prince Andrew has been publicly named as Tangbo Yang after a judge on Monday lifted an anonymity order protecting his identity.
The 50-year-old Chinese national, also known as Anglicised alias Chris Yang, has been banned from entering Britain from March 2023 on national security grounds.
Yang challenged that Home Office decision, an appeal which was rejected by the Special Immigration Appeals Commission last week.
Business relations were established with Prince Andrew and access to a network of other senior British political and business figures, mainly through his company Hampton Group International, which it said would "invest in, advise on and enable opportunities between China, the UK and the rest of the world". is focused on
MI5 alleged that Yang was a member of the Chinese Communist Party working for the United Front Work Department. UFWD collects intelligence on behalf of the Chinese state.
The commission's ruling found that Yang "was in a position to form relationships with prominent UK figures and senior Chinese officials that could be leveraged by the CCP for the purposes of political interference."[Chinese Communist party]. . . or the Chinese State”.
Yang previously worked with UK drugmaker GSK to manage the fallout from a bribery scandal. chinaAccording to people familiar with the matter.
Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Commons Speaker, approved an urgent question tabled by Sir Iain Duncan Smith, a prominent Tory China hawk, on Monday afternoon.
GSK had no comment.
GSK was introduced to Yang by former McLaren chief executive Ron Dennis, one of the people said. Neither Ron Dennis nor McLaren responded to a request for comment.
The anonymity order was reviewed at a hearing at the Royal Court of Justice on Monday, before MPs threatened to use parliamentary privilege to name the man in the House of Commons.
Yang, previously known only as H6 in court documents, has already been named on social media and some foreign news sites.
This is a developing story