The Sinicization of New Zealand

How China is Buying New Zealand with Campaign Contributions
By Charlotte Graham-McLay

Jami Lee Ross, a National lawmaker, accused the party’s leader of trying to disguise a donation of 100,000 New Zealand dollars as smaller anonymous donations.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — The two politicians started their conversation casually, but there was serious business at hand: a "donation" recently deposited into a party account from a Chinese businessman, which totaled 100,000 New Zealand dollars.
The reported size of the donation, about $66,000, was large by New Zealand standards. 

But the cash, the lawmaker says, came with strings attached — a promise to add the names of two Chinese businessmen to a list of candidates for Parliament — and a plan to disguise the identity of the Chinese donor, a man with deep pockets and well-documented connections to the Chinese Communist Party.
The conversation, a recording of which was leaked last week, is the latest in a series of scandals that suggest New Zealand is vulnerable to political interference at a time when China is seeking greater influence throughout the Pacific.
New Zealand is often portrayed as a progressive paradise far removed from the rest of the world, but it plays an important role in the Five Eyes network, an alliance of Western intelligence agencies assigned to listen in on communications worldwide. 

Jian Yang, the most famous Chinese mole in a Western country

Similar concerns were raised last year when it was revealed that Jian Yang, a Chinese lawmaker and member of the National Party, had taught at a Chinese spy academy. 

Yang denied being a spy and remains in Parliament.
Analysts and allies fear that China can buy influence on the cheap and without raising alarms in New Zealand’s political system, which has weak rules about lobbying, by channeling money through small, anonymous donations.
Political donations, said Miguel Martin, a commentator who writes about China under the pseudonym Jichang Lulu, are an expedient way for the Communist Party to acquire “an avenue of influence on that country’s policy.”
Politicians at the local and national levels and from every party are desperate for funding, and therefore potentially easy prey.
“There’s kind of a ‘let the good times roll’ aspect with politicians in New Zealand, where historically money has been hard to come by and parties — by global standards — don’t have much of a budget at all,” said Rodney Jones, a New Zealand economist based in Beijing.
While contributions made directly from foreigners could raise red flags, Mr. Jones said, donations from wealthy, Chinese-born New Zealanders with connections to the Chinese Communist Party are delivered to politicians “on a platter.” 

It is in the politicians’ self-interest not to ask any too many questions about where the money originated.
The conversation leaked last week between the leader of New Zealand’s largest opposition party and a once-trusted lawmaker has prompted a national discussion about whether New Zealand should tighten its campaign finance rules, or introduce a registry of lobbyists like those in the United States and Australia.

Beijing stooge Simon Bridges, leader of the country’s largest opposition party

Jami Lee Ross, a member of the center-right National Party, accused the party’s leader, Simon Bridges, of fraud by trying to disguise a 100,000 New Zealand dollar donation as smaller, anonymous donations.
By law, the identities of contributors who donate less than 15,000 New Zealand dollars are allowed to remain anonymous.
Mr. Ross turned over to the police, and made public online, a phone call he had secretly taped with Bridges in June, in which the pair discussed a "donation" from the businessman, Yikun Zhang. 

Simon Bridges and his Chinese case officer, businessman Yikun Zhang.

The recording did not contain clear evidence that Bridges had asked for the "donation" to be broken up, and Bridges has denied doing so. 

The police are investigating whether the National Party failed to declare a donation from Zhang.
The National Party has said it did nothing illegal, but has yet to explain how the donation discussed in the call was handled.
The mention of Zhang piqued the interest of China analysts, who said the businessman had known ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
Zhang served in the People’s Liberation Army and headed a provincial consultative group for the Communist Party before emigrating to New Zealand in 2000. 

His “entire life is in the shadow of the Communist Party,” said Chen Weijian, a member of the pro-democracy group New Zealand Values Alliance.
Zhang is chairman of the influential Chao Shan General Association of New Zealand, an organization started in 2014 for New Zealanders born in the Chinese town of Chaoshan, but which has become an important intermediary between China and New Zealand. 

He plans to host 1,000 Chinese visitors at a business conference next year in Auckland, the country’s largest city.
Zhang’s “positions and relationships” gave the Chinese Communist Party “leverage enabling it to ‘guide’ or simply expect individuals like Zhang to be aligned with the CCP’s policy goals,” said Mr. Martin.
Zhang has appeared in news photographs with both opposition lawmakers and those in the government, including Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

Chinese businessman Yikun Zhang with his intimate friend Jacinda Ardern

Ardern this week defended the electoral donation system, and said the country’s politics free from Chinese interference.
Zhang has also attended a fund-raising auction for Phil Goff, the mayor of Auckland, and is currently traveling in China with another New Zealand mayor.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, center, and Mayor Phil Goff of Auckland, right, at a rally in September. Both politicians have links to Yikun Zhang, a wealthy businessman.

It is Zhang’s second trip to China with that Chinese mayor, Gary Tong of Southland.
Representatives for both the Labour and National parties did not respond to questions about whether they intended to investigate the foreign political connections of their donors, and the law does not require them to do so.
While politicians cannot accept large donations from foreigners, analysts said lawmakers should be more savvy about where their money comes from.
Anne-Marie Brady, a Canterbury University professor who published a paper about what she called China’s global blueprint for influencing Western democracies, told Radio New Zealand that the government should consider reforming rules around electoral finance, conflicts of interests, and “whether it’s O.K. to be a member of a New Zealand political party and a foreign political party.”
(The New Zealand police and Interpol are investigating a burglary of Ms. Brady’s home in February, which she believes was carried out by agents linked to Beijing.)
In the leaked recording between the two lawmakers, Mr. Ross reminds Bridges that he had also discussed with Zhang a potential political “candidacy” for two of his New Zealand-Chinese business associates. 

In New Zealand, some lawmakers campaign for seats representing a local constituency, while others are selected for Parliament by their political parties, and do not have to run for office.
“Two MPs, yeah,” Bridges can be heard responding, in a reference to members of Parliament. 

Bridges said last week that he had not been promising candidates for cash.
China is New Zealand’s biggest trading partner and New Zealand is hoping to expand a free-trade agreement signed in 2008.
New Zealand is not the only country wrestling with issues of China’s reach. 

Australia in June approved a sweeping national security law that, among other things, requires foreign lobbyists to register on a public list. 

New Zealand, on the other hand, does not require domestic or foreign lobbyists to register.
Australia’s law was prompted by revelations that two businessmen of Chinese descent had donated millions across the political spectrum.
Mr. Ross, the lawmaker who released the recorded call, both resigned and was expelled from the National party last Tuesday, but maintained on Friday that he would remain in Parliament as New Zealand’s only independent lawmaker.

Kiwi Quisling

China "donations" throw New Zealand politics into turmoil 

National party leader Simon Bridges denies concealing cash from Chinese "businessman"

By Jamie Smyth in Sydney and Edward White in Taipei 

New Zealand's Sam Dastyari: Simon Bridges in parliament on Wednesday.

Simon Bridges and his agent handler Zhang Yikun

New Zealand has become the latest western nation to be engulfed in controversy over political "donations" made by Chinese "businessmen" with links to the Chinese Communist party. 

Simon Bridges, leader of the National party, on Wednesday denied allegations he had attempted to conceal a NZ$100,000 (US$65,900) donation by Zhang Yikun, a Chinese 'businessman' in Auckland. 

The allegations were reported to New Zealand police by National MP Jami-Lee Ross, who released a secretly recorded telephone conversation between himself and Bridges discussing a NZ$100,000 donation and the possibility of recruiting more Chinese as election candidates. 

The tape also contains disparaging comments made by Bridges against fellow National MPs. 

Mr Ross has alleged that Bridges asked Zhang to split up the NZ$100,000 donation to the party into smaller payments to ensure they would not have to be disclosed under New Zealand’s electoral law. 

Bridges’ actions amounted to electoral fraud. 

Under New Zealand election law donations above NZ$15,000 must be disclosed. 

Bridges rejected the claims on Wednesday.

“Jami-Lee Ross, in this conversation, deliberately tried to set me up,” said Bridges. 

He confirmed he had attended a dinner in May with Zhang where the donation was discussed. 

Grant Duncan, a political commentator in New Zealand, said the link between the dinner, the donation and the discussion about more Chinese candidates raised questions over Chinese influence in New Zealand politics. 

He said the tape would prove damaging to Bridges’ leadership. 

Anne-Marie Brady, a professor at University of Canterbury, said Zhang’s associations were typical of the United Front Work Department, which is a branch of the ruling Communist party. 

Zhang was born in Guangdong, southern China, and served in the Chinese military before moving to New Zealand in 2000, becoming a prominent businessman and leader of the Chinese community in Auckland. 

He has kept close ties with the Chinese government. 

From 2013 to 2016 Mr Zhang was a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference of Hainan, an advisory body to the Chinese government, according to a Chinese government website. 

In August this year he attended a meeting of expatriates and returned overseas Chinese in Beijing — an event also attended by Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang, Wang Qishan and other senior Chinese Communist party figures, according to local media reports. 

Last month in New Zealand Zhang was awarded a prestigious national honour for his services to the Chinese community and business ties between the two countries. 

Among the achievements cited by New Zealand’s governor-general was his founding of the Chao Shan General Association, an organisation focused on the Chinese community in New Zealand. 

The Australian arm of the Chao Shan organisation was considered by two academics in Australia to be part of China’s United Front network in that country, according to their submission to the Australian parliament in 2018. 

Zhang could not be contacted for comment. 

Jian Yang, most famous Chinese mole in New Zealand

Nation of spies: New Zealand security chiefs warn of China threat

Agencies call for robust response from new government to Beijing’s drive for influence 
By Jamie Smyth in Sydney

Famous Chinese mole Jian Yang

Zealand’s security chiefs have called for a more vocal government response to national security threats after a spate of spying incidents highlighted Beijing’s attempts to influence the country’s growing Chinese community.
Briefings prepared for Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Andrew Little, the minister in charge of security agencies, mark the latest official expression of concern over Beijing’s political influence in New Zealand and Australia as they experience a surge in political activity from people with close ties to China’s Communist party as their Chinese-born populations surge.
One briefing cites “activities in New Zealand over the past year [that] have included attempts to access sensitive government and private sector information, and attempts to unduly influence expatriate communities”.
While the identity of the foreign governments spying in New Zealand are redacted, security experts say Beijing is stepping up a campaign to influence China’s growing diaspora in the Pacific nation and a host of other western countries. 
About 4 per cent of New Zealand’s population, or 171,411 people, identified themselves as ethnically Chinese in the 2013 census, with a further 19,000 Chinese citizens gaining residency over the past four years. 
The briefings on New Zealand’s security environment say that until recently it has been rare for the country’s prime ministers or national security system to openly provide information on security matters.
Unlike in Australia, where a public debate on Chinese influence has been raging for months and has led to a change in policy, New Zealand’s politicians have been reluctant to discuss the matter openly.
“We think that a wider dialogue with the public, on a regular basis and covering a wide range of national security issues, will support a risk and resilience-based approach to national security by normalising issues that can often seem quite abstract or removed from most New Zealanders,” another of the briefings says. 
Beijing on Monday played down the concerns expressed in the briefings, saying it was interesting that “recently, many western countries have spontaneously become concerned about interference in their internal affairs”.
 The briefings follow a report by the FT in September about how New Zealand’s spy agency had investigated a Chinese-born member of parliament in connection with 15 years he spent working at elite Chinese military training academies.
Jian Yang, an MP for New Zealand’s ruling National party since 2011, denied being a spy, saying the reports were a “smear campaign” motivated by anti-Chinese racism. 
 “The New Zealand intelligence community is telling the government they have got a problem and they need to deal with it publicly, to put some sunlight on it,” said Anne-Marie Brady, politics professor at the University of Canterbury. 
 She said China was undoubtedly the country referred to in the security briefing as seeking to influence its expatriate community.
A Canterbury university report co-authored by Ms Brady identified Beijing’s financial support for a wide range of New Zealand “United Front” organisations, aimed at advancing Chinese interests. 
Wellington remains reluctant to speak publicly about Chinese influence in domestic politics, fearing it could hurt commercial ties with Beijing as it seeks to upgrade its trade deal with China, Ms Brady said.
 China is New Zealand’s second-largest trade partner, accounting for 17 per cent of all exports in 2016 and total two-way trade worth NZ$23bn ($16bn).
 Western nations including the US, Germany and Australia are increasingly highlighting Beijing’s use of covert espionage, propaganda activities and attempts to influence its Chinese diaspora to advance its interests overseas. 
 Last week Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull cited “disturbing reports about Chinese influence” in domestic politics following the publication of tough new spying and foreign influence laws.
That followed revelations that Sam Dastyari, an opposition Labor senator who received Chinese cash, called publicly for Australia to respect China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea — a position contrary to that of his party.
 Beijing reacted furiously to the Australian rhetoric, with the Chinese embassy in Canberra deriding the ““irresponsible remarks” made by some Australian politicians and officials “to the detriment of political mutual trust”.
 A Monday article in China’s state-run People’s Daily described Australian media’s coverage of alleged Chinese influence as paranoid and racist.

Chinese Fifth Column

A Sino-Kiwi Lawmaker’s Spy-Linked Past Raises Alarms on China’s Reach
By CHARLOTTE GRAHAM

Chinese mole: Jian Yang, a New Zealand lawmaker born in China, at a news conference in Auckland, New Zealand, last month. A recent investigation revealed that he had taught spies in China in the 1980s and ’90s.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Revelations that a New Zealand lawmaker had been a member of the Communist Party in China and taught English to spies there have raised alarms about Beijing’s influence in New Zealand — and how well the political parties there vet their candidates.
Jian Yang, a lawmaker with the center-right National Party, did not declare his past Communist Party affiliation or his work teaching spies in China on his New Zealand citizenship application. 

He was returned to Parliament for a third term in the country’s Sept. 23 elections.
Days before the election, as some New Zealanders were casting advance ballots, Mr. Yang’s background was exposed in a joint investigation by The Financial Times and the New Zealand online media outlet Newsroom.
While New Zealand is a small country, it is a member of the “Five Eyes” intelligence sharing partnership along with the United States, Britain, Canada and Australia. 

And so vulnerabilities in New Zealand’s government could have wider import.
Yang admitted that in the 1980s and early ’90s, before emigrating to Australia and then moving to New Zealand to teach at a university, he studied and taught at two Chinese educational institutions run by the People’s Liberation Army, China’s armed forces.

He said he had not named the Chinese military institutions on his application for New Zealand citizenship, and had instead listed “partner institutions” as his employers, because that was what the Chinese “system” had told him to do.
Yang conceded that he had taught English to spies, but said he had never been a spy himself, was no longer a member of the Communist Party, and had been contracted and paid only as a so-called civilian officer.
Yang has not been officially investigated in New Zealand or charged with espionage.
But Nicholas Eftimiades, a former officer with the Central Intelligence Agency with extensive experience on China matters, said the title of civilian officer was a fluid one in China.
Mr. Eftimiades, now a lecturer at Penn State Harrisburg in Pennsylvania, said officers moved seamlessly between military and civilian assignments to include Chinese army units and work in the defense industry, think tanks and universities.

New Zealand’s prime minister, Bill English, and his wife, Mary, during an election-night event in Auckland last month. English said the National Party had been aware of Yang’s background, and Yang had made no attempt to hide it. 

“Whether in uniform or not, these personnel are still actively engaged in espionage,” said Mr. Eftimiades, who also worked with the Defense Intelligence Agency in the United States.
Several China experts said in interviews that it was not possible for people to willingly “leave” China’s Communist Party, as Yang said he did, unless they had been expelled from it. 

Yang has not denounced the party.
Rodney Jones, a New Zealand economist who lives in Beijing and who has worked in Asia for 30 years, said that an “unrepentant” former member of the Communist Party should not be eligible to be a New Zealand lawmaker. 

He said that Yang should resign from Parliament.
Mr. Jones said that New Zealand needed better representation of its Chinese population in Parliament, but that Yang’s ascension showed that New Zealand had become a “tributary state” of China.
The leadership of both major political parties in New Zealand said they were not concerned by the revelations. 

Bill English, the incumbent prime minister whose party Yang belongs to, said through a spokesman that he did not “see any obvious signs of anything inappropriate” and would not be interviewed on the matter.
English said the National Party had been aware of Yang’s background, and Yang had made no attempt to hide it.
Mr. Jones criticized the prime minister’s lack of alarm, saying the disclosure warranted an investigation.
The revelation comes as both the National and Labour parties have come under scrutiny in a report on China’s influence on the New Zealand government by Anne-Marie Brady, a political-science professor at New Zealand’s University of Canterbury.
Ms. Brady said that since the ascension of Xi Jinping, China’s government has mounted an aggressive campaign of using soft power to influence New Zealand’s politics, economy and society, including through campaign donations.
In her report, Ms. Brady said that this year “a Chinese diplomat favorably compared New Zealand-China relations to the level of closeness China had with Albania in the early 1960s.”

Parliament House in Wellington, New Zealand. The country’s main political parties have come under scrutiny recently in a report on China’s influence on the New Zealand government. 

She said the Chinese-language media in New Zealand was subject to extreme censorship, and accused both Yang and Raymond Huo, an ethnic Chinese lawmaker from the center-left Labour Party, of being subject to influence by the Chinese Embassy and community organizations it used as front groups to push the country’s agenda.
Huo strongly denied any “insinuations against his character,” saying his connections with Chinese groups and appearances at their events were just part of being an effective lawmaker.
Chinese-language news media outlets in New Zealand reported that Yang had presented awards in April to members of the New Zealand Veterans General Federation, a group made up of former Chinese military or police officers now living in New Zealand. 

The awards were for members’ activities during a visit to New Zealand by Premier Li Keqiang of China, when they blocked the banners of anti-Chinese government protesters and sang military songs.
Yang would not comment on the report, other than to say in a statement that “allegations about my loyalty to New Zealand” were “a racially and politically timed smear.”
Chen Weijian, a member of the pro-democracy group New Zealand Values Alliance and the editor of a Chinese-language magazine, Beijing Spring, said Yang was “very, very active” in New Zealand’s Chinese community.
“When he speaks, he speaks more as a Chinese government representative, instead of a New Zealand lawmaker,” Mr. Chen said.
New Zealand has become increasingly dependent on China as a market for farm products, especially dairy goods, and the two countries have been in talks to expand a free-trade agreement signed in 2008.
Despite the criticism, Yang has continued to appear alongside Wang Lutong, China’s ambassador to New Zealand, at public events, including for China’s National Day celebrations this week, when he posed for photos with the ambassador and a Chinese military attaché.
Mr. Jones, the Beijing-based economist, said China’s level of involvement in New Zealand could threaten the country’s democratic institutions. 

Both he and Ms. Brady, the author of the report on China’s growing influence, have called for New Zealand to ban foreign political donations, as Australia is moving to do.
“New Zealand has become so fearful of the Chinese economic power we’re prepared to throw our values and standards overboard,” Mr. Jones said, adding, “There’s no reason for the fear, except for elites in New Zealand who may lose money personally.”

Chinese moles exploit the vulnerability of open democracy

Soft targets like New Zealand and Australia are testing grounds for Chinese global espionage By Jamil Anderlini

Jian Yang is probably China's top mole in New Zealand

Openness, diversity and tolerance are the greatest strengths of the world’s liberal democracies.
But to autocratic regimes like China, these same attributes are vulnerabilities ripe for exploitation.
As reported by the Financial Times on Wednesday, a sitting member of the New Zealand parliament has been investigated by the country’s spy agency in connection with the decade he spent training and teaching at elite military and military intelligence institutions in China, his country of birth.
The fact Jian Yang, an MP for New Zealand’s governing National Party since 2011,  was able to enter parliament with very little scrutiny and serve on a committee overseeing foreign affairs, defence and trade, and that his education and military intelligence background appeared nowhere on his official biographies in New Zealand, raises some troubling questions. 
People may put this down to naivety on the part of innocent Kiwis.
But “soft targets” like New Zealand and Australia are just testing grounds for China’s global espionage activities. 
In the past five years China has massively expanded its efforts to infiltrate, influence and spy on western democracies and these efforts have already been remarkably successful in countries like Canada, the US and the UK. 
In response to reports about his military intelligence background, Yang has suggested he is being “smeared” purely because he is Chinese.
This defence goes to the heart of the problem facing liberal democracies.
All citizens in these countries should feel safe from being profiled and targeted by intelligence agencies just because of their ethnic background or the country they were born in.
Strong protections of human rights and personal privacy clearly differentiate a country like New Zealand from China, where the ruling Communist party carries out unchecked surveillance on a massive scale and assumes all non-Chinese in the country are potential foreign spies.
But it is hard for Yang to argue he is being targeted because of his ethnicity rather than the decade he spent training and teaching in some of China’s top military and intelligence institutions. 
The fact he has consistently advocated international policies that match those of the People’s Republic of China, and that he appears to work closely on many issues with the Chinese embassy in New Zealand, makes his military intelligence background even more relevant. 
If he was from, say, Italy, had trained and taught for a decade in Italian military intelligence academies and then became an MP in New Zealand who regularly spoke out on behalf of Italian interests, it would be equally problematic.
It is also hard for Yang to argue that reporting on his background 10 days before a general election in New Zealand is somehow racist persecution when he has gone to great lengths to conceal his past from the general voting public. 
If anything, the Chinese intelligence apparatus should take responsibility for fomenting anti-Chinese sentiment abroad through its relentless attempts to recruit ethnically Chinese agents in target countries. 
Even if Yang has never worked for China’s intelligence services in New Zealand, his occasional references in Chinese language media to his time at the innocuous-sounding “Luoyang Foreign Languages Institute” would have acted as an intimidating dog whistle for the overseas Chinese community in that country — most Chinese speakers would know, or could easily discover, that the institute is the main linguistics training facility for Chinese military intelligence.
Far from evidence of racism, an investigation by intelligence agencies into Yang’s background and current activities is aimed at protecting those members of the Chinese immigrant community who have chosen to leave authoritarian China and settle in a democracy.
But liberal open democracies are more fragile than most people believe, and without the courage to face up to the potential threat posed by illiberal countries and their subversion efforts, we are all contributing to the erosion of what makes these systems so great.

New Zealand's Top Chinese Mole

China-born New Zealand MP probed by spy agency
By Jamil Anderlini in Hong Kong
Chinese mole Jian Yang spent decade at elite Chinese military academies. The Beehive, part of New Zealand's parliament buildings, where Jian Yang has served as an MP since 2011.

Jian Yang, left, with Senior Colonel Wang Liwei, defence attaché, at an event held at the Chinese embassy in Wellington to mark the 88th anniversary of the founding of the People's Liberation Army in 2015.

The mole and New Zealand Prime Minister Bill English give the thumbs up at a campaign event.

New Zealand’s national intelligence agency has investigated a China-born sitting member of parliament in connection with the decade he spent at leading Chinese military colleges.
Jian Yang, an MP for New Zealand’s ruling National Party, spent more than 10 years training and teaching at elite facilities including China’s top linguistics academy for military intelligence officers, the Financial Times has learnt.
Since being elected in 2011, Yang has been a big fundraiser for the National Party.
He has consistently pushed for closer ties with Beijing and for international policies and positions echoing those of China’s Communist party.
The fact he has served for six years in the governing party of a member country of the “five eyes” intelligence alliance raises questions about western preparedness to deal with China’s increasingly aggressive efforts to influence foreign governments and spy on them.
 “China has been very active in recent years placing and cultivating people at the grassroots political levels of western democracies and helping them to reach positions of influence,” said Christopher Johnson, a former senior China analyst at the US Central Intelligence Agency now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Mr Johnson warned that while Beijing appeared to see New Zealand as a softer target than countries such as the US and UK, “it is using it as a testing ground for future operations in other countries”.
Yang, 55, lived in China until he was 32.
No information about his Chinese education or military background is included in his official biographies in New Zealand or those published when he was an academic at Auckland university.
He served on New Zealand’s parliamentary select committee for foreign affairs, defence and trade from October 2014 until he was replaced in March 2016.
As number 33 on the National Party list for the September 23 general election he is very likely to be returned to parliament for a third term under the country’s mixed member proportional electoral system.
Yang on Wednesday insisted he was "loyal" to New Zealand, said the reports about his background were a “smear campaign” and suggested that anti-Chinese racism was the motive.
After the FT published its investigation, at a press conference in Auckland he said he had never been a spy but acknowledged training people who went on to be intelligence officers.
“If you define those cadets or students as spies, yes, then I was teaching spies,” he told reporters.
“I don’t think so. I just think they are collecting information through communication in China.”

The National Fifth Column
Peter Goodfellow, president of the National Party and the person who recruited Yang, said his background was “public knowledge” in New Zealand and he had “no idea” about an investigation by the country’s Security Intelligence Service (SIS).
“He certainly gave us his full résumé with the two universities — an air force academy and the other one,” Mr Goodfellow said.
He also said Yang’s background was “covered in a review of candidates” by a government relations consultancy, Saunders Unsworth.
Prime Minister Bill English told New Zealand media on Wednesday that he had been aware “from early on” of Yang’s “military training, including military intelligence”.
Someone with Yang’s background would not normally gain security clearance to work on foreign affairs in New Zealand but elected MPs are exempt from such requirements.
Yang has represented New Zealand on numerous official trips to China and been present at many high-level meetings between the two countries’ leaders.
Several New Zealand politicians have been briefed by the SIS on its interest in Yang, a naturalised New Zealand citizen.
SIS agents also conducted interviews with people familiar with Yang’s background as recently as last year, according to people with direct knowledge of the matter.
The SIS told the Financial Times it did not comment on operational matters, especially investigations involving individuals.
A spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry said on Wednesday it did not comment on the internal affairs of other countries but nevertheless rejected what it said were “groundless, false accusations”. In 2010 the director of Canada’s Security Intelligence Service warned that several Canadian provincial cabinet ministers and government employees were “agents of influence” under the control of China. 
In recent months Australia has also indicated it is concerned about Chinese intelligence operations and covert campaigns influencing the country’s politics.
But no other western country is known to have a sitting member of parliament with such extensive training in China’s military intelligence apparatus. 
“In the last five to 10 years, Chinese intelligence agencies have moved heaven and earth to recruit anyone in public life anywhere in the world who they think might work for them,” said one person familiar with Yang who is an expert in China’s global intelligence efforts.
“With his education background [Yang] would be a prime target if he was not already an active agent.”
Yang entered the People’s Liberation Army Air Force Engineering Academy as an undergraduate majoring in English language in 1978 and later taught at the academy after graduation.
“Someone who taught at that institute would have to be an officer in the PLA as well as a member of the Communist party,” said Peter Mattis, an expert on China’s military and intelligence at the Jamestown Foundation in Washington.
After teaching at the air force academy, Mr Yang went on to the Luoyang Foreign Languages Institute, an elite facility for China’s military intelligence officers. 
It is attached to the third department of the PLA general staff headquarters — equivalent to the US National Security Agency or the UK’s Government Communications Headquarters — and specialises in training both openly acknowledged military intelligence officers and “secret line” deep cover agents. 
“Everyone I know who’s attended the Luoyang Foreign Language Institute has been in Chinese military intelligence or at least linked to that system,” Mr Mattis said.
In a Chinese-language interview with the FT, Yang acknowledged he had attended the PLA Air Force Engineering Academy and the Luoyang Foreign Languages Institute but repeatedly requested that this information not be included in any article about him, saying “there’s no need to write too much about my personal situation”. 
He declined numerous subsequent interview requests over several days.
Interviewed on Wednesday by Newsroom, a New Zealand-based independent media group, Yang refused to comment, saying repeatedly on camera: “Ask my boss” and “I have nothing to hide”.
He then drove away, but after publication of the story on Wednesday he issued a statement calling the news a “smear campaign” and suggesting racism as the motive.
He said: “I refute any allegations that question my loyalty to New Zealand.
“I have been nothing but upfront and transparent about my education and employment. Although I was not born here, I am proud to call myself a New Zealander, obey our laws, and contribute to this country.”
He added: “This is a smear campaign by nameless people who are out to damage me and the National party 10 days from an election, just because I am Chinese.”
A former senior British intelligence official said someone with Yang’s educational background would usually go on to a career in military intelligence.
After graduating from Luoyang, Yang studied between 1988 and 1989 at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies.
At that time the majority of Chinese students attending were either military intelligence officers or Chinese state security agents, according to three former senior western intelligence officials.
One of Yang’s classmates was Xu Meihong, a famous Chinese military intelligence officer who was assigned in 1988 to spy on a visiting US history professor but was subsequently arrested on suspicion of betraying her country. 
Ms Xu later married the professor, Larry Engelmann, became a venture capitalist in Silicon Valley and wrote a book about her experience entitled Daughter of China: A True Story of Love and Betrayal. 
It is unclear what Yang did between 1989 and 1994, the year he was granted an “AusAID” scholarship to study at the Australian National University in Canberra.
Given his background, Yang would have needed permission from the Chinese government and military to leave China.
At ANU he completed a masters degree and PhD focused on US Congressional policy towards China and in 1999 he moved to New Zealand to teach international relations at Auckland university.
Yang has been a big National party fundraiser among New Zealand’s large Chinese community, including from big-spending anonymous donors, according to local media reports.

New Zealand's Chinese Moles

Sino-Kiwi MP trained by Chinese spies
By Mark Jennings and Melanie Reid

Chinese mole Jian Yang

A National Party MP who studied at an elite Chinese spy school before moving to New Zealand has attracted the interest of our Security Intelligence Service.
The list MP Jian Yang did not mention in his work or political CVs a decade he spent in the People's Liberation Army-Air Force Engineering College or the Luoyang language institute run by China's equivalent of the United States National Security Agency.
That agency, the Third Department, conducts spying activities for China.
Newsroom has been told that to have taught at the Air Force Engineering College, Yang would have been an officer in Chinese military intelligence and a member of the Communist Party, as other students and staff have been.
Yang studied and then taught there before moving to Australia where he attended the Australian National University in Canberra. 

He migrated to this country to teach international relations in the politics department at the University of Auckland.
He was hand-picked by National Party president Peter Goodfellow to become an MP on its list in 2011, wooed directly by the former Prime Minister John Key and has been a key fundraiser for National among the Chinese community in Auckland.
As an MP he variously served on Parliament's Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade (from 2014 until last year), Commerce, Transport and Industrial Relations and Health and Science select committees and is prominent in New Zealand's interactions with the Chinese community and diplomatic and consular missions in Wellington and Auckland. 

He remains a Parliamentary Private Secretary for ethnic affairs.

Chinese mole
Newsroom has worked with the Financial Times in Hong Kong to investigate Yang's background.
We can reveal Yang confirmed in a recorded interview in Chinese with the Financial Times that he attended both military institutions.
In his comments to the FT researcher, Yang twice urged her to concentrate on the New Zealand election. 

"You don't need to write too much about myself," he said, adding later: "As for me myself, actually I don't feel it's necessary to include so many detailed things."
Interviewed today, by Newsroom, Yang refused to comment, saying repeatedly on camera: "Talk to my boss" and "I have nothing to hide". 

He then drove away.
Yang later released a statement saying he refuted "any allegations that question my loyalty to New Zealand".
The statement said he had been "nothing but upfront and transparent" about his education and employment.
Yang challenged those who were "propagating these defamatory statements" to front up and prove them.
"This is a smear campaign by nameless people who are out to damage me and the National Party 10 days from an election, just because I am Chinese."
An expert in Chinese intelligence -- Peter Mattis -- told Newsroom from the US that someone who attended and then taught at the Air Force Engineering College and attended the language institute would almost certainly have been an officer in China's PLA and member of the Communist Party.

SIS interest
New Zealand's Security Intelligence Service has scrutinised him at times over three years, including interviewing one person about him last year.
The SIS said today it would not comment on operational matters, especially investigations involving individuals.
A hearing of Parliament's Privileges Committee into intelligence surveillance protocols for MPs occurred in late 2013. 

If an intelligence agency has cause to monitor an MP, the SIS director or Inspector-General of Intelligence is to brief the Speaker of the House. 

The Privileges Committee, chaired at the time by Attorney-General Chris Finlayson, polices contempts, which can include anything that could impede or restrict the rights of MPs to conduct their business unimpeded.
A Memorandum of Understanding between the SIS and Parliament's Speaker from 2010 says: "The only circumstances in which collection may be directed against a sitting MP is where a particular MP is suspected of undertaking activities relevant to security."
It is not known if the Speaker, David Carter, or Prime Ministers John Key or Bill English, who were the ministers in charge of the SIS, have been briefed on Yang's background or the SIS interest. Comment is being sought from Bill English.
National Party President Peter Goodfellow claimed in an interview with the Financial Times this morning that Yang's education in China was widely known in New Zealand.
Goodfellow said he had “no idea” about any SIS investigation into Yang.
“He certainly gave us his full resume with the two universities – an air force academy and the other one,” Goodfellow said. 

“You’re making a number of assumptions based on his background and I’d be careful unless you have proof of what you’re saying.”
He also said Yang’s background was “covered in a review of candidates” by a government relations consultancy, Saunders Unsworth.
Interest in Yang's background precedes his moving to New Zealand. 

Officials at ANU were suspicious of his close ties to China when he worked there.
China-watchers suggest someone educated at an elite PLA Air Force Engineering College and then at the Luoyang Foreign Languages Institute would have had to be a member of the Chinese Communist Party to be allowed to stay on and teach. 

It was considered unusual for someone with intelligence connections to be allowed to leave China for Australia to study, or to have done so without the backing of the party or PLA.Jian Yang beside National leader Bill English and with 'Blue Dragons' supporters at a party policy launch. 

Hidden decade
Yang's maiden speech to Parliament did not mention his education at the military establishments, although he noted that in 1978, the year Deng Xiaoping began China's economic reforms, "I passed the newly-restored higher education examination and became part of the small group of high school graduates who went on to university".
The missing decade in Yang's CV is reflected in that speech. 

After saying he entered university in 1978, the next date he gives is: "In April 1989, a great opportunity was opened up for me when I received a scholarship to Johns Hopkins University in the United States."
The Tiananmen massacre and global controversy in June that year prevented him from leaving for that study. 

Chinese sources do not discuss where he worked for the next five years but he did attend the Johns Hopkins centre for American-Chinese study in Nanjing for one year.

Active politics
In 1994 Yang began postgraduate studies at the ANU, achieving a doctorate and then taking the job in Auckland. 

He credits professors Barry Gustafson and Raymond Miller with helping him in his political education in New Zealand and colleagues for encouraging the move from political theory to professional politics.
In his maiden speech Yang outlined the failure of socialist economic policies in China before 1978 and its success in introducing capitalism with socialist characteristics, lifting millions from poverty, encouraging entrepreneurialism, personal responsibility, and reward for achievement.
"Reflecting on the way in which China has achieved its positive change and development gives me a firm belief that the policies of the National Party are in the best interests of New Zealand," he said.
Yang's involvement in the foreign affairs and trade select committee at Parliament did not require security clearances because elected MPs are not subject to the normal public service requirements. 

He is said to be a central figure promoting and helping shape the National government's China strategy and responsible for its engagement with the New Zealand Chinese community.
In 2014, former Prime Minister John Key attended a fundraising dinner organised by Yang for wealthy ethnic Chinese voters, which the New Zealand Herald and Stuff websites reported raised $200,000 for the party's election campaign.

Studying intrigue
The emergence of Yang's study and work at the military intelligence institutions in China has intrigued China-watchers in both Australia and this country. 

The engineering college is reputedly one of China's 10 top military academies. 

The 'Luoyang Foreign Language Institute' is part of the Third Department of the Joint Staff Headquarters of the PLA -- one of two main military intelligence agencies. 

The institute, in Henan province in central China, has around 500 teaching staff for 29 languages and has had 50,000 graduates including 100 generals.
The Third Department is responsible for China's signals intelligence operations and for providing intelligence assessments based on information gathered. 

According to author Mark Stokes in his 2015 The PLA General Staff Department, Third Department, Second Bureau, linguists assigned to that section are sent to Luoyang for language training "then assigned to a Third Department bureau for mission specific technical training".
Yang is understood to have met his wife, Jane, an IT specialist, at Luoyang.
The China expert Mattis, author of the book Analysing the Chinese Military and a former staffer of the US National Bureau for Asian Research told Newsroom the Third Department covered all forms of signals intelligence.
"It could be direction finding for signals, it could be encryption, it could be trying to break the codes of other countries, other militaries -- and today that involves computer network exploitation."
Asked if it was conducting spying, he said: "Yes. This is the national signals intelligence authority that pretty much every country has. In the US it is the NSA, in the UK it is GCHQ and in Australia the National Signals Directorate."
Yang's time at Johns Hopkins Nanjing was a strong indicator of his intelligence involvement as in the era he attended many of the Chinese students were from military intelligence.
"It is certainly a signal indicator that when combined with others will cleanly identify someone as being a part of Ministry of State Security or military intelligence."

Australia and New Zealand
He said there was a plausible scenario for Yang leaving China for Australia: he is working for military intelligence, most likely China's Second Department, dealing in human intelligence.

Since coming to New Zealand in 1999, Yang had been active in semi-official New Zealand discussions and events with China, Japan and Southeast Asian countries.
In the National Party, Yang is prominent with a large group of Chinese members calling themselves the Blue Dragons and campaigning enthusiastically at events during this campaign, including National's launch at the Trusts Stadium in Henderson on August 27.
Asked if it was unusual internationally for someone with a military intelligence background in one country to be an MP in another, Mattis said: "It is something I would have hoped that his colleagues in the National Party would have put to him in the vetting process ... because certainly on its face, it would be quite disconcerting."
"There are countries with whom we are friendly, but there are no friendly intelligence services."