In India, arrests of three China ‘spies’ raise concerns, questions

Family members and lawyers of three people arrested two weeks ago by the “Special Cell” of the New Delhi police on charges of spying for China have alleged unfair treatment by authorities, pointing to an 11th-hour move by police on Sunday to extend their detention another 14 days. Rajeev Sharma, 61, an Indian citizen and freelance journalist who wrote for publications including Chinese tabloid Global Times and was working on a book about India’s Home Minister Amit Shah, was arrested for espionage on September 14. Chinese national Qing Shi and Nepali national Sher Singh were arrested a day later. Police accused all three of being on the payroll of Chinese intelligence agencies and charged them under India’s Official Secrets Act, according to Indian media reports. Sharma’s lawyer Adish Aggarwala said he attended Sunday’s court hearing by video conferencing and opposed the extension of custody as his client was in poor health. He said he would seek bail for Sharma on Monday. “He has had two operations before, and is an elderly citizen. This puts him in danger of catching the coronavirus if he is detained for longer,” Aggarwala said. “We have a good chance of getting bail as there is nothing against my client that police have.” Raveesh Singh, the lawyer for Qing and Singh, said he was not allowed to attend the proceedings and police had insisted his clients wanted a state-appointed lawyer. “But I have been appointed by their families, who want me to continue. Qing and Singh have not said anything otherwise to me,” he said. Attempts to reach Bhagwan Singh, the investigating officer on the case, were unsuccessful. The trio were arrested amid ongoing tensions between India and China over a stand-off at their Himalayan border. Political ties have since deteriorated with New Delhi tightening the approval process for inbound Chinese investments and expanding a ban on Chinese mobile apps. On September 19, the Press Club of India questioned the nature of the arrests, pointing to a statement police released to the media that same day. In the statement, police laid out several accusations against the trio, but their legal representatives later pointed out they had not even received copies of the First Information Report (FIR) that according to Indian law must be shared with the accused. Indian journalist gave border secrets to Chinese spies, police allege It was not until a week later that New Delhi’s Chief Metropolitan Magistrate ordered the Special Cell to share Sharma’s and Qing’s FIR with their lawyers. The Press Club in its statement described Sharma as a “well-known independent journalist of long standing” and pointed out the “dubious track record of the Special Cell”. “On the basis of the statement of the police released to the media, we have no hesitation in saying that the police action is high-handed, and may be inspired by obscure or questionable considerations,” the Press Club statement said. Sharma’s wife Pratima Vyas, a Delhi-based college professor, also wrote to the Special Cell, claiming she and her husband had been forced to sign a document they were not allowed to read and that there had been a delay in allowing Sharma access to his lawyer. The letter, reproduced by Indian media, included Vyas’ claims police had destroyed and fabricated evidence. New Delhi’s ‘Chinese hawala scam’ and Dalai Lama spying case – is there more than meets the eye? “The interrogation of my husband has become illegal as he has been deprived of his right to have the presence of the lawyer of his choice,” she wrote. According to the police statement, Chinese intelligence operatives “tasked” Sharma with conveying information related to Indian army movements and military cooperation with other countries, defence acquisitions, the Dalai Lama, foreign policy and other matters. The police said they had acted on a tip-off by Indian intelligence officers who said among other things that Sharma was receiving Western Union money transfers for “conveying sensitive information” about India’s national security and foreign relations. Officers claimed “confidential” documents were seized from his house during a search operation. They also said Sharma confessed to his crimes and revealed he was in touch with two “handlers” named “Michael” and “George” based in Kunming, China. Michael reportedly contacted Sharma via LinkedIn after reading columns he wrote for China’s state-run Global Times, which is affiliated with the Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily, between 2010 and 2014. In a piece in July, he urged rapprochement between New Delhi and Beijing. India-China border: is peace really on the horizon? According to the statement, Sharma was in touch with Michael and one more agent from 2016-18. He visited Laos and the Maldives to meet his alleged handlers and went to Kunming last year to meet George, who was introduced as a manager for a media company. Police accused Sharma of receiving 3 million rupees (US$40,690) since last January via Qing Shi, acting as an intermediary, in return for providing George with updates about the Dalai Lama. The police statement said Qing was running a shell company along with Singh on behalf of two other Chinese nationals based in China. They were laundering money using Hawala channels to pay Sharma, police said. Sharma’s lawyer, Adish Aggarwala, said his client’s “only crime” was meeting Chinese nationals in Kunming between 2016 and 2018 as they claimed to represent a media organisation interested in publishing his work. Aggarwala has maintained that his client did not possess any classified documents. “All his correspondence with the so-called handlers consisted of him emailing his columns and journalistic inputs,” he told This Week in Asia. “All the documents in his possession were already in the public domain.” India-China border: stand-off continues in Chushul, where ‘mountains eat up men’ Raveesh Singh, the lawyer for Sher Singh and Qing, said Qing had lived in India since 2013. “She studied pharmacy at Jamia Hamdard University in Delhi. Following her studies there, she interned at G.B. Pant hospital in Delhi, which is a government-run hospital,” the lawyer said, adding that the fake company Qing was accused of running was a business promoting medical tourism from China to India. ‘Product of China’: India snubs China-educated doctors even amid Covid-19 He added that while Qing and Sher Singh ran the company together, they did not live together in a flat in South Delhi, despite recent Indian media reports to the contrary. The president of the Resident Welfare Association of the apartment complex where Qing lived, N.S Mor, said she had been there since June 22. “We had sent her details to concerned authorities for verification but nothing was conveyed by them which was adverse,” Mor said. “This is generally considered to be a sign that nothing is amiss with the resident.”