Security ban on Chinese businessman emerges in ruling
13/12/2024 6:12
A Chinese businessman, who
had forged close links with Prince Andrew and was authorised to
act on his behalf to seek investors in China, has been banned
from Britain on national security grounds.
The 50-year-old man, who has been granted anonymity and is
named only as H6, was taken off a flight from Beijing to London
in February 2023 and told that Britain intended to ban him from
the country. This happened the following month.
H6 appealed against the ban at the Special Immigration
Appeals Commission (SIAC), which rejected his case in a written
ruling on Thursday – the first time the reported relationship
has come to light.
Buckingham Palace no longer comments on matters relating to
Andrew, who was removed from royal duties by the palace in 2022,
and Reuters was unable to reach him or a representative for
comment.
The ban on the Chinese businessman came after the
contents of his phone were downloaded when he was stopped under
counter-terrorism laws at a UK border in 2021, the ruling said.
It said this revealed Prince Andrew had authorised him to
set up an international financial initiative to engage with
potential partners and investors in China. The ruling did not
say what the fund was intended for.
Documents on his phone suggested H6 had "deliberately
obscured his links" with the Chinese Communist Party and the
United Front Work Department and been in a position to generate
relationships between prominent UK figures and senior Chinese
officials which Beijing could leverage, the ruling stated.
The United Front Work Department is a network of groups that
Chinese leader Xi Jinping has described as a "magic weapon" to
bolster Beijing's reach abroad.
The Chinese embassy in London was not immediately available
to comment after working hours.
BIRTHDAY PARTY
SIAC's decision revealed a letter from a senior advisor to
Andrew to H6 from March 2020, which noted H6 had been invited to
Andrew's birthday party that month and stated: "I also hope that
it is clear to you where you sit with my principal and indeed
his family.
"You should never underestimate the strength of that
relationship ... outside of his closest internal confidants, you
sit at the very top of a tree that many, many people would like
to be on."
It added that following a meeting between Andrew, H6 and the
adviser they had "wisely navigated our way around former Private
Secretaries and we have found a way to carefully remove those
people who we don't completely trust".
"Under your guidance, we found a way to get the relevant
people unnoticed in and out of the house in Windsor," the letter
said. The ruling did not say who the people were or give the
reason for potential distrust.
The prince, 64, the eighth in line to the throne, was a
roving UK trade ambassador from 2001-2011.
He was forced to step aside from public duties in 2019 over
his friendship with the late U.S. sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Andrew has always denied any accusations of wrongdoing. In 2022,
the royal family removed his military links and royal
patronages.
The SIAC ruling referred to a 2021 document recovered from
H6's device which listed talking points for a call between him
and Andrew which said the prince "is in a desperate situation
and will grab onto anything".
Judge Charles Bourne said in the ruling that H6 had "won a
significant degree, one could say an unusual degree, of trust
from a senior member of the royal family who was prepared to
enter into business activities with him".
The judge added: "That occurred in a context where, as the
contemporaneous documents record, the Duke was under
considerable pressure and could be expected to value (H6's)
loyal support.
"It is obvious that the pressures on the Duke could make him
vulnerable to the misuse of that sort of influence."
Bourne said Britain's Home Office was entitled to conclude
that H6 had significant links to the Chinese Communist Party and
the United Front Work Department and that there was potential
for him "leveraging" his relationship with Andrew.
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