{"id":75997,"date":"2026-01-18T18:19:38","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T09:19:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/jan\/18\/chinese-mega-embassy-london-british-spies-mi5-analysis"},"modified":"2026-01-18T18:19:38","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T09:19:38","slug":"why-a-chinese-mega-embassy-is-not-such-a-worry-for-british-spies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=75997","title":{"rendered":"Why a Chinese \u2018mega embassy\u2019 is not such a worry for British spies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Politicians are raising the alarm, while MI5 quietly welcomes the prospect of Beijing\u2019s new London facility<\/p>\n<p>While there has been no shortage of politicians eager to raise concerns about China\u2019s proposed \u201cmega embassy\u201d near the Tower of London, the espionage community quietly takes a different view, arguing that concerns about the development are exaggerated and misplaced.<\/p>\n<p>The domestic Security Service, MI5, is already quietly welcoming the prospect of rationalising China\u2019s seven diplomatic sites to one, but a more significant argument is that modern technology and the nature of the Chinese threat means that, in the words of one former British intelligence officer, \u201cembassies are less and less relevant\u201d.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/jan\/18\/chinese-mega-embassy-london-british-spies-mi5-analysis\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Politicians are raising the alarm, while MI5 quietly welcomes the prospect of Beijing\u2019s new London facilityWhile there has been no shortage of politicians eager to raise concerns about China\u2019s proposed \u201cmega embassy\u201d near the Tower of London, the espio&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":310,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,50,667,1345,52,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-china","category-espionage","category-mi5","category-uk-news","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/310"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75997"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75998,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75997\/revisions\/75998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}