Key Points
- Prince Andrew said he “ceased all contact” with a Chinese businessman accused of being a spy on government advice.
- The man was banned from entering the UK in 2023, which he challenged at the country’s immigration appeals commission.
- The commission rejected his case on Thursday, the first time he and Andrew’s relationship had come to light.
Prince Andrew has “ceased all contact” with a businessman accused of being a Chinese spy who had forged links with the disgraced royal.
Andrew’s contact with the man dominated the United Kingdom’s front pages on Friday, the latest humiliation for a prince whose reputation is already in tatters over his ties to accused sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Former interior minister Suella Braverman banned the 50-year-old man, identified only as H6, from entering the country in 2023 after her ministry found he had engaged in “covert and deceptive activity” on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
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.
In the ruling, judges assessed that H6 was in a position to “generate relationships between senior Chinese officials and prominent UK figures which could be leveraged for political interference purposes by the Chinese State”.
Prince Andrew stepped aside from public duties in 2019 over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein. Credit: EPA
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, a network of groups that Chinese leader Xi Jinping has described as a “magic weapon” to bolster Beijing’s reach abroad.
The tribunal heard that the prince’s aide, Dominic Hampshire, told the suspected spy that he could help in potential dealings with Chinese investors.
“Outside of his (Andrew’s) closest internal confidants, you sit at the very top of a tree that many, many people would like to be on,” Hampshire told H6 in a 2020 letter. H6 also received an invitation to the prince’s birthday party.
In a statement, the Chinese embassy in London accused some in Britain of making up “all kinds of ‘spy’ stories against China”. Source: Anadolu / Getty Images
A statement from Andrew’s office said that the Duke of York had “followed advice” from the government and “ceased all contact with the individual after concerns were raised”.
“The duke met the individual through official channels, with nothing of a sensitive nature ever discussed,” it said.
Buckingham Palace no longer comments on matters relating to Andrew.
In a statement, the Chinese embassy in London said some people in Britain were keen on making up “all kinds of ‘spy’ stories against China”.
“Their purpose is to smear China and sabotage normal people-to-people exchanges between China and the UK. We strongly condemn this,” the statement said.
Asked whether the prince’s advisers should have been more alert to the danger, former minister of state for security Tom Tugendhat told the BBC that “it’s not quite as black and white as it may first appear — but it’s certainly extremely embarrassing”.
Andrew was forced to in 2019 over his friendship with the late US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew has always denied any accusations of wrongdoing.
The former Royal Navy helicopter pilot, 64, brought by Virginia Giuffre, who claimed he sexually assaulted her when she was 17.
In 2022, the royal family removed his military links and royal patronages, effectively shutting him out of royal life.
