A former top Australian intelligence official has been charged with mishandling classified documents, officials said yesterday, years after his home was raided during an investigation into Chinese influence operations.
Police and government officials said that Roger Uren had on Wednesday appeared in court over mishandling sensitive intelligence.
He is believed to be facing about 30 charges.
The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation — the main domestic spy agency — raided Uren’s Canberra home in October 2015 and uncovered a stash of classified files.
Uren had been the deputy head of the now-defunct Australian Office of National Assessments, which provided intelligence analysis to the prime minister, and was once considered a possible ambassador to China.
At about the time of the raid, his Chinese-Australian wife, Sheri Yan (嚴雪瑞), a fixer and lobbyist, was arrested in the US on bribery charges.
She pleaded guilty and was jailed in 2016 for conspiring to bribe former UN General Assembly president John Ashe.
Australian lawmaker Andrew Hastie last year used his parliamentary privilege to claim the US$200,000 bribe was provided by Chinese Communist Party-linked businessman Chau Chak Wing (周澤榮), who has denied the allegations and sued media organizations for making similar claims.
The Australian Federal Police (AFP) yesterday said that Uren was arrested last week and appeared before an Australian Capital Territory court “in relation to allegations he illegally dealt with classified intelligence information.”
“The AFP investigation alleges unauthorized removal and retention of classified intelligence information from the man’s place of employment,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
Australian Broadcasting Corp had previously reported that the “highly classified” files laid out what Western spy agencies knew about Chinese intelligence operations.
Uren was granted bail and ordered to reappear in court in February next year.
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