'Don't believe US sweet talk'

John Leung Shing-wan, a Hong Kong-born man with US citizenship who was sentenced to life imprisonment for spying in China, recently made a public appearance in a video series released by the Ministry of State Security of the People's Republic of China.

In the video, which was released to commemorate National Security Education Day, Leung confessed to regretting his crime and warned the Chinese people about the deceptive tactics employed by the United States.

"I want to tell all Chinese people, all their [the United States'] sweet talk are untrue."

According to the Ministry, Leung, who is now 78 years old, was born in Hong Kong in 1945 and moved to the United States in 1983, where he ran a restaurant.

In 1986, he was approached by US intelligence agents and subsequently recruited by a US spy agency in 1989.

He was promised a monthly payment of US$1,000 (HK$7,837) in exchange for providing intelligence.

It was during this time that he also became a US citizen.

"US intelligence agents helped Leung create a false background and instructed him to work in various overseas Chinese organizations, where he posed as a patriotic philanthropist while gathering information," the ministry said.

Leung allegedly used 'honey traps' to coerce Chinese officials into cooperating with the US. For his service, he was awarded a medal of merit by the US intelligence agency.

In April 2021, Leung was arrested after state security obtained evidence of his spying activities. He was subsequently convicted and sentenced in a Suzhou court in May that same year.

The video series released by the ministry also highlights nine other cases of espionage activities that were uncovered. One such case involved Lee Henley Hu Xiang, a Shanghai-born Belizean businessman who was sentenced to 11 years in prison in 2021 for funding anti-national security activities during the 2019 social unrest in Hong Kong.

The Ministry aims to raise public awareness about espionage through these ten featured cases, emphasizing the importance of remaining vigilant and preventing spies from finding refuge.

It plans to release another series of videos today, focusing on 10 citizen reporting cases.