Free Republic

Wang Liqiang, who publicly defected from Beijing on Australian national television, has been denied asylum. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) said Wang could not be granted refugee status despite having “well-founded” concerns about returning to China because he committed fraud before entering Australia on a tourist visa, The Daily Telegraph reported. The AAT also doubted Wang’s espionage claims and questioned how it could “safely find that (Wang) was engaged in espionage ­activities.” Wang defected to Australia in 2019 and provided an unprecedented account of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) influence operations overseas. In an interview with The Epoch Times, the...

Would-be defector Wang Liqiang seemed to confirm Australia’s worst fears of Chinese infiltration. The fresh-faced, bespectacled 27-year-old, dubbed the “first Chinese operative to ever blow his cover”, recounted alarming tales of espionage and political sabotage in Australia, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Wang recalled meeting with the head of a spy ring operating freely down under, coordinating a “cyber army” to manipulate public opinion during elections in Taiwan, working with a front company charged with infiltrating Hong Kong universities and media, and ordering the kidnapping of one of the five Hong Kong booksellers known to sell titles critical of the leadership...