According to the indictment, the 41-year-old woman, Linda Sun, is said to have tried to strengthen China and the Communist Party’s position with the governor and prevented contact between New York and Taiwan, the BBC writes.
– It is an important issue for China, which wants to cut off Taiwan’s opportunities for international exchange, says Björn Jerdén at the Foreign Policy Institute in SVT’s Aktuellt.
The prosecutor in the case believes that the woman’s actions have meant a “threat to the nation’s security” and, according to the indictment, she must have “acted on orders, direction or requests” from Beijing in exchange for gifts worth millions of dollars.
– We already know, from several different cases and several different countries, that the Chinese state works systematically and long-term to influence the political system around the world, says Jerdén.
Spying during the EU elections
Similar cases were noticed in connection with the EU elections in the spring, when two people were arrested in Germany suspected of having spied on behalf of Russia and four more on behalf of China.
Around the same time, SVT’s Uppdrag review, in collaboration with Göteborgs-Posten, was able to reveal that the Swedish government decided to deport a Chinese journalist, when, according to Säpo, she had conducted security-threatening activities in Sweden for over a decade.
According to Björn Jerdén, it is primarily Swedish technology and innovations that are of interest to Chinese agents in Sweden.
Denies crime
Linda Sun and her co-accused husband, Christopher Hu, deny wrongdoing and China’s Foreign Ministry has said it does not comment on US domestic affairs, but that it opposes “any malicious association or slander of China”.