Two Chinese nationals with People’s Liberation Army (PLA) backgrounds have been charged or detained in South Korea over alleged military espionage, according to a report that cites a prosecution indictment. The case has fueled suspicion that Beijing is running organized intelligence operations there.
The first suspect, a man in his 60s identified as A, allegedly served 40 years in a PLA signals-monitoring unit under the General Staff Department in Beijing, retiring as a lieutenant colonel. Prosecutors say he intercepted military communications 13 times between March 2024 and August 2026, using radio receivers and antennas set up in hotel rooms near air force towers and runways. Seven of the incidents took place at Gunsan, which hosts both South Korean and U.S. air forces. He allegedly took 13.9 terabytes of recordings and frequency data back to China. He was arrested at a Gunsan hotel after re-entering the country shortly before the Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise. He says it was “a hobby.”
The second suspect, B, is an ethnic Korean Chinese in his 40s and a Chinese Communist Party member who allegedly served in PLA special forces and public security from 1998 to 2006. Running a military-uniform shop near Camp Humphreys, he allegedly cultivated a U.S. soldier and a South Korean civilian employee at U.S. Eighth Army headquarters with meals and gifts. He is accused of obtaining footage of Apache and F-35 training, parachute drills and exercise review materials, then passing summaries to outside parties through Chinese messaging apps and social media. B says he was merely building rapport for his business.
Experts note a string of similar cases, including Chinese nationals convicted for photographing naval and air bases. They warn that dissolving the military counterintelligence command and curtailing prosecutors’ powers, leaving roughly 100 police investigators on counterespionage, could worsen the problem.
Source: Chosun Daily, September 29, 2026
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