‘Brazen’: Former Prime Minister’s Son Claims He Was Approached By Chinese Spies

Former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull speaking to press. Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s son Alex has disclosed he was the target of “suspected Chinese agents” in 2017 while his father was in the top job.

This comes after the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) director general Mike Burgess revealed a former politician sold out their “country, party and former colleagues to advance the interests of the foreign regime.”

Mr. Burgess divulged the politician offered to provide access to a Prime Minister’s family member, but he did not provide timings, nor name the politician or foreign country.

Speaking to news.com.au, Mr. Turnbull said he suspected he may have been the family member of a former Prime Minister mentioned by Mr. Burgess, but he could not confirm this.

Describing the approach from foreign agents, Mr. Turnbull revealed it was “brazen” and he notified intelligence services immediately.

“It was just so brazen. My reaction was to express no interest and forward the details immediately to the authorities,” Mr. Turnbull said.

He told the publication the group had links to a “former NSW Labor state MP.”

In his speech, Mr. Burgess revealed the politician was a target of an “A-team” of spies who posed as consultants, head-hunters, local government officials, academics, and researchers claiming to be from fictional companies like “Data 31.”

“At one point, the former politician even proposed bringing a prime minister’s family member into the spies’ orbit. Fortunately, that plot did not go ahead but other schemes did,” Mr. Burgess said in an Annual Threat Assessment speech.

Taken on June 26, 2016, former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's son Alex (R) and wife Yvonne (L), as well as daughter Daisy (blue dress). Jason Edwards-Pool/Getty Images

The ‘A-Team’

In his revelations, Mr. Burgess said the A-team, which stands for Australia team, trawled professional networking sites looking for Australians with access to privileged information, and then used false identities to speak to their targets.

“Most commonly, they offer their targets consulting opportunities, promising to pay thousands of dollars for reports on Australian trade, politics, economics, foreign policy, defence, and security. Additional payments can be offered for ‘inside’ or ‘exclusive’ information,” he said.

“This might suggest the A-team’s priority is classified material, but its appetites are wider than that. We have seen it try to recruit students, academics, politicians, businesspeople, researchers, law enforcement officials, and public servants at all levels of government.”

Mr. Burgess said unfortunately too many Australians “miss the warning signs” making the work of the A-team too easy.

“On just one professional networking site, there are 14,000 Australians publicly boasting about having a security clearance or working in the intelligence community. Some even out themselves as intelligence officers—even while proving they’re not particularly good ones,” he said.

Mr. Burgess said he wants the A-team and its masters to understand if they target Australia, ASIO will target them.

The Sydney Morning Herald later said it had independently verified that the “A-Team” was connected to a division of the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) tasked with infiltrating the Australian government.

Through checking court records and briefings, the media outlet revealed that ASIO uncovered MSS' infiltration of Labor and Coalition parties via interference operations since 2019.

However, it noted that the ASIO had taken a soft stance against the CCP as the agency had been reluctant to publicly name the communist regime as a malicious state actor.

Defence Minister Respects Confidentiality of ASIO

Australian Defence Minister Richard Marles, asked if the alleged politician should be named, said he respected ASIO maintaining confidentiality.

Mr. Marles also said those involved in public administration, including politicians, should be vigilant about the threat of foreign espionage in this country.

“Look, I respect what ASIO have done here in terms of putting this story into the public domain, but also maintaining the confidentiality of the facts around this, and there could be a whole lot of reasons why that should happen,” Mr. Marles told reporters.

“We have amongst the best agencies in the world protecting Australians, and Australians should have a sense of confidence about that. This is what ASIO is doing in respect of handling this particular case.

“I don’t know the facts which underpin the scenario that Mike Burgess has outlined. And I think for good reason, those facts are being kept confidential. It’s important to understand the threat ... and that we are vigilant about it.”

He said Defence is an “obvious target” for foreign espionage and therefore it matters that they have the “highest levels of security.”

“But it is also really important—why this scenario has been put into the public domain by the director general of ASIO. We cannot be too vigilant in the way in which we go about our work and it is a very timely reminder of what’s at stake,” he said.

Former treasurer and ambassador to the United States, Joe Hockey, said the individual should be named and noted he had already been asked questions from U.S. officials about ASIO’s comments.

“It is absolutely inconceivable that you would have a former politician representing their community, representing the country, who then goes and engages with a foreign adversary, and somehow they’re allowed to walk off into the sunset without having their name or their reputation revealed,” Mr. Hockey said.

“It makes us all question as representatives in the Parliament who we can trust, who of our current and former colleagues can we trust? And that’s ridiculous.”

Former New South Wales Labor politicians Ernest Wong and Sam Dastyari have both come out and said it wasn’t them, The Australian newspaper reported.

Finance and Public Service Minister Katy Gallagher declined to name the former Australian politician in the Senate on Feb. 29, amid questioning from One Nation Senator for Queensland Malcolm Roberts.

Ms. Gallagher said the director general had made a deliberate decision not to name the individual and the government respected his judgement.

“The government respects his judgement. He has our 100 percent support. He has the full picture, and he made an informed decision,” Ms. Gallagher said.

“The threat assessment made clear that we need to continue to be vigilant and sober in how we respond to threats, and this is what we are doing.”