London (AsiaNews/Agencies) – A justice at the Central Criminal Court (Old Bailey) in London ruled that Bill Yuen Chung-biu and Peter Wai Chi-leung, two men with links to the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) in London, will go on trial on 10 February 2025.
Both were arrested in early May under the UK’s National Security Act on charges of espionage and surveillance against Hong Kong exiles who fled to the British capital after the crackdown against protests in 2019. The two are currently out on bail.
A third man was arrested with them, Briton Matthew Trickett, but he was found dead in a park on Sunday, in unclear circumstances, a few days after his release.
The case is turning into a diplomatic incident as it puts the spotlight on Hong Kong’s overseas trade offices.
Charged with promoting trade with the Chinese special administrative region, the network of 14 trade offices has been accused by human rights groups of engaging in espionage and intimidation against Hong Kong exiles, protected by their diplomatic status.
This is a particularly hot topic in the United Kingdom since the British government opened its doors to more than 200,000 Hongkongers with a British National (Overseas) passport who fled the repression of 2019 in what was until 1997 a British crown colony.
UK authorities recently released data on visas granted to BN(O)s in the first three months of 2024, showing that as a result of Hong Kong’s new national security law implementing Article 23, departures from the territory have started to pick up again, with 10,737 new arrivals, up over the same period in 2023.
Yuen, Wai, and Trickett were arrested earlier this month after allegedly trying to break into the home of a BN(O) passport holder who recently moved to London, accused of taking part in “information gathering, surveillance and acts of deception, that [were] likely to materially assist a foreign intelligence service” between 20 December 2023 and 2 May 2024.
Bill Yuen, 63, is an HKETO officer based in London, as well as a retired Hong Kong police officer. He is accused of instructing Wai and Trickett to conduct surveillance and raiding the BN(O) home.
Peter Wai, 38, is the director of a UK-registered private security firm, D5 Security Consultancy Limited, which also involved 37-year-old Matthew Trickett, the man found dead.
According to some witnesses, the latter announced his intention to take his own life after his arrest, but there are still doubts about this story.
Yesterday Hong Kong’s Secretary for Trade and Economic Development Algernon Yau asked the British authorities to find the “truth" behind this death, the first reaction coming from China in this affair.
Meanwhile, in the UK, seven MPs from different political parties have called for a review of the diplomatic status and privileges granted to the HKETO.
“If employees of the HKETO were operating as accomplices of transnational repression, beyond their legitimate remit of economics and trade, the option of closing the London HKETO should be considered,” reads their signed joint statement.
Photo: Hong Kong Democracy Council
