A former British marine charged with spying for Hong Kong’s intelligence service has died, in keeping with a police assertion launched on Tuesday night.
The person, who was named by the Thames Valley Police as Matthew Trickett, was discovered useless in a park in Maidenhead, a city west of London, on Sunday. Mr. Trickett was one in every of three males charged final week beneath Britain’s Nationwide Safety Act with helping the Hong Kong intelligence service, and their case was anticipated to return to courtroom on Friday.
Hong Kong is a former British colony and a particular administrative area of China, and tensions between London and Beijing have been ratcheting up in latest months because the British authorities has turn into more and more vocal over allegations of Chinese language espionage. Within the wake of the costs final week, Britain summoned the Chinese language ambassador for a reprimand.
Mr. Trickett, 37, who was a British immigration enforcement officer and a former Royal Marine, was additionally the director of a non-public safety agency, MTR Consultancy.
In accordance with the police, a member of the general public alerted the authorities to a state of affairs in Grenfell Park in Maidenhead on Sunday about 5:15 p.m. Mr. Trickett, who was from the realm, was discovered and, regardless of the efforts of emergency responders, was pronounced useless on the website.
“An investigation is ongoing into the dying, which is at present being handled as unexplained,” the police stated in a press release, including that “a autopsy can be carried out sooner or later.”
The police have appealed to the general public for any info that might assist in their investigation.
In a press release supplied to Reuters, Mr. Trickett’s household stated they had been “mourning the lack of a much-loved son, brother and member of the family.”
Mr. Trickett had been launched on bail after being charged with helping a international intelligence service and with international interference. The Metropolitan Police stated in a press release final week that “the international intelligence service to which the above fees relate is that of Hong Kong.”
The situations of Mr. Trickett’s bail required him to register at a police station commonly, in keeping with the Thames Valley Police. He was awaiting courtroom hearings that had been set to start on Friday in London’s central prison courtroom.
China’s crackdown on protesters and different advocates for democracy in Hong Kong has pushed lots of of hundreds of individuals to hunt refuge elsewhere over fears that they might be persecuted.
Since 2021, Britain has allowed some Hong Kong residents to settle within the nation beneath a particular visa program, and greater than 160,000 individuals, together with high-profile activists, have arrived.
