Dominic Cummings claims China ‘stole’ UK’s classified state secrets | Politics | News
Dominic Cummings has made a bombshell claim that China successfully stole large amounts of British state secrets by 2020. Mr Cummings, who serves as Boris Johnson’s most senior adviser, revealed that he was informed in 2020 that Beijing had carried out a massive, high-level data breach involving “strap” material.
“Strap” intelligence is the government’s term for the most highly classified information. In an interview this afternoon, Mr Cummings said: “The cabinet secretary said, ‘We need to explain something; there’s something seriously wrong’ and explained what it was. “And it was so strange that not only Boris but a number of people in the room were looking around like: ‘Am I somehow misunderstanding what he’s saying? Because it sounds crazy.”
“Material from the intelligence services. Material from the National Security Secretariat in the Cabinet Office. Things that the government should keep secret. If they’re not secret, then there are very, very serious consequences.”
He told me more Times It was stated that Britain’s most senior officials covered up the leak and refused to explain what specific information was obtained and how.
Mr Cummings used the shocking claim to counter Keir Starmer’s claim that the ongoing Chinese spying scandal collapsed because the government refused to describe Beijing as a “threat”.
“Anyone with high-level knowledge of China-related intelligence services knows that the word threat doesn’t even cover it.
“The degree of infiltration in espionage, in operations of all kinds, in infiltration of critical national infrastructure, in the theft of intellectual property, in many other areas, is absolutely extraordinary. It is a hundred times worse than it is in the public domain.”
“Anyone who has heard from the intelligence services about critical analysis of these things knows this to be true. The idea that whether or how much of a threat they should be described as a threat is somehow a difficult semantic question is absolutely childish nonsense. And everyone at the heart of Whitehall knows it.”
“The suspension system was compromised. Every system was compromised. The essential infrastructure for transferring the British state’s most sensitive data was compromised for long periods of time. For years.”
Mr Cummings said he would be happy to provide further details of the massive leak if MPs chose to hold a committee hearing.
The former top adviser also added that the current Prime Minister may not have been informed of the major security breach, warning: “I strongly suspect the authorities are covering this up and it wouldn’t be a surprise… I wouldn’t be surprised if not a single current minister knew about it.”
He said he had been told by intelligence services that senior ministers had put Britain’s economic relationship with China ahead of the country’s security for many years.
