Following pressure from Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party, the name of the alleged Chinese spy connected to Prince Andrew has been revealed as Yang Tengbo.
After Farage’s Reform UK threatened to use parliamentary privilege to disclose the name of the alleged Chinese spy, a High Court lifted restrictions on Monday afternoon. Previously only identified as “H6”, the reported “close confidant” of the Duke of York can now be named as Yang Tengbo, also known as Chris Yang, the Guardian reports.
Responding to the disclosure, Mr Farage said: “I am pleased that pressure by Reform over the last 48 hours has now led to this man being named. The public deserve to know.”
It emerged last week that an alleged Chinese spy with business ties to Prince Andrew was under investigation by Britain’s MI5 security service. The Duke of York’s office has claimed that the Prince had “ceased all contact with the individual after concerns were raised” and that “nothing of a sensitive nature ever discussed”.
A former chairman of the Hampton Group, Yang had been a frequent visitor of the UK over the past two decades. However, he was barred from entering Britain last year over national security concerns. Previously he was subject to search from counter-terrorism services in 2021.
According to court documents, the Chinese national was granted authority to act on behalf of the Duke of York to secure investment and potential business partners in China, with Yang having connections to the Chinese wing of Prince Andrew’s Pitch@Palace investment project.
A court ruling last month which upheld his ban from Britain found that he “won a significant degree, one could say an unusual degree, of trust from a senior member of the royal family who was prepared to enter into business activities with him.”
Alleged Chinese Spy linked to Prince Andrew ‘Tip of the Iceberg’https://t.co/xWVgNCEJ1r
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) December 16, 2024
The court also found that Yang had “downplayed” his ties to Beijing’s United Front Work Department (UFWD), an influence scheme of the Chinese Communist Party to gain sway over international elites.
The ruling stated that he was in a position to “generate relationships between senior Chinese officials and prominent UK figures which could be leveraged for political interference purposes by the Chinese State.”
In a statement reported by The Telegraph, Yang claimed that he was a “victim” of the “political climate” in Britain, asserting: “When relations are good, and Chinese investment is sought, I am welcome in the UK. When relations sour, an anti-China stance is taken, and I am excluded.”
“I am an independent self-made entrepreneur and I have always aimed to foster partnerships and build bridges between East and West. I have dedicated my professional life in the UK to building links between British and Chinese businesses. My activities have played a part in bringing hundreds of millions of pounds of investment into the UK,” he said.
“I built my private life in the UK over two decades and love the country as my second home. I would never do anything to harm the interests of the UK.”
The spying scandal is just the latest to rock the upper echelons of the political establishment in Britain. In 2022, the founder of the British Chinese Project and a major donor to the now-governing Labour Party, Christine Lee was accused of working on behalf of Beijing. Mr Farage warned at the time that there are a “lot more” Chinese operatives embedded in Westminster, noting that the “British establishment have been sucking up to China for a long time.”
Labour Party Accepted £700,000 From Alleged Chinese Communist Spy: Reporthttps://t.co/hsE1AIC22L
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) January 14, 2022
