Canada: Feds Ignore Spies

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http://www.canoe.ca/TopStories/spies_apr30.html

Sunday, April 30, 2000

Feds ignore spies

Police source tells Sun espionage by China is looting Canada of hi-tech secrets By JONATHAN KINGSTONE -- Toronto Sun

TORONTO - The federal government is burying evidence that Chinese spies are slipping into Canada as refugees to steal nuclear and hi-tech secrets, a police source said yesterday.

Chinese government agents and Asian gangs have established a crime network that's infiltrated dozens of major Canadian companies -- posing a national security threat, said the source who spoke on the condition that his position remain secret.

"It's quite obvious there are agents being brought in as refugees. I've come across them," the officer said. "Out-and-out agents of the (Chinese) state.

"Once they're in Canada their only goal is to commit industrial and military espionage.

"This has been going on for years and nothing is being done about it," he said.

"It's apathy. The federal government should be whipped."

The officer was responding to a published report yesterday that detailed the threat to Canada's national security posed by the Chinese government and Asian organized crime gangs, known as triads.

The study, titled Chinese Intelligence Services and Triads Financial Links in Canada, was prepared in 1997 by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

The 23-page document, known as Project Sidewinder, asserts that more than 200 major Canadian firms are under the direct or indirect control of China.

In one case, Ontario Hydro believes nuclear technology was stolen "by an individual of Chinese origin," the report states. The man faxed information to a number that was traced to the Chinese state science and technology commission.

In two other examples cited by the report, Chinese-origin employees working at Canadian hi-tech companies stole information and sold it to China.

"They're well entrenched," the source said of the spies and gang members. "Most of them hide behind the cloak of being legitimate businessmen."

He said Canada is seen as an easy target because of its lax immigration and refugee laws. More than 200,000 Hong Kong residents immigrated to Canada in the 1990s.

"It's so easy to smuggle in surreptitious agents, who claim refugee status then go underground as agents of the People's Republic of China," the officer said.

He said triad gangs are "honoured" to work for their government by stealing Canadian technology, including computer chips and software.

"Canada spends billions on research and development and China doesn't have to spend that if they steal it ... it's a national threat because Canada is going to lose income.

"And computers are used to drive the weapons these days," the source said.

Asian crime experts from Toronto Police, the OPP and the RCMP as well as CSIS agents spent years warning Ottawa about the threat after triads were first detected in Toronto in 1977, the source said.

Their warnings were ignored, and the officer said it was because of political pressure.

Yesterday's published report quoted sources who said the CSIS report was watered down and kept secret. The report says Hong Kong tycoons won favour with Canadian politicians.

"Our whole system of government, our procedures and the way we conduct business is all based on honesty," the source said.

"We're slowly learning they're a lot of dishonest people out there."

-- viewer (justp@ssing.by), May 01, 2000


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