Police have confirmed that a man in his 20s was arrested in March and released on bail until next month.
China has lashed out at Britain, saying reports that a British parliamentary researcher had been arrested on suspicion of spying for China were “malicious defamation”.
Britain’s Sunday Times reported that the 28-year-old researcher, who had spent some time teaching in China after graduating from university, was arrested in March.
He was employed by Alicia Kearns, a ruling Conservative Party MP and chair of parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, the newspaper said. The suspected spy has also been linked to Security Minister Tom Tugendhat, who has been critical of Beijing and is the founder of the China Research Group, which brings together conservative MPs looking for “new thinking” on China.
A number of British MPs, including Tugendhat, have been sanctioned by Beijing.
Britain’s Metropolitan Police confirmed this weekend that two men had been arrested: a man in his 20s on suspicion of espionage and a man in his 30s on suspicion of offenses under the Official Secrets Act.
Both were arrested in March and released on bail until October, she added.
After reports of the arrests emerged, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak told Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang at the G20 summit in New Delhi that he had “very serious concerns” about Beijing’s “interference” in democracy.
However, a spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in London called the reports “malicious defamation.”
“The claim that China is suspected of ‘stealing British intelligence’ is completely fabricated and nothing more than malicious slander,” the spokesman said in a statement published late on Sunday.
“We firmly oppose it and urge relevant parties in Britain to stop their political manipulation against China and stop staging such self-staged political farce.”
The Sunday Times said the man suspected of espionage was the son of a doctor who had grown up in an affluent suburb of the Scottish capital and emerged as a formidable parliamentary networker.
On X, formerly known as Twitter, Kearns, who is also part of the China Research Group, said she was aware of the allegations and would not comment.