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The Philippines will send a team to Australia to learn about its efforts to guard against foreign interference, with Manila’s top security adviser acknowledging that domestic laws are outdated and do little to protect against malign influence operations and modern espionage.
National Security Adviser (NSA) Eduardo Año disclosed this on Tuesday evening, August 13, at a gathering of selected journalists and editors hosted by the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict.
As National Security Advisor, Año is co-vice chair of the task force, as well as co-vice chair of similar task forces such as the West Philippine Sea National Task Force.
Año confirmed an exclusive report by Rappler that named a suspected Chinese editor, who intelligence sources confirmed was an agent of the Philippine Ministry of State Security (MSS).
Zhang “Steve” Song, entered Manila as Shanghai bureau chief or chief reporter Wenhui DailyThe group is said to have established an influence and espionage network since 2021, infiltrating key sectors of the Philippine government, media, and key industries such as energy and power. The intelligence agency said that “the network poses a threat to the national security, political stability and sovereignty of the Philippines.”
Speaking to the media on the evening of August 13, Arnold pointed out that Zhang was an “agent of influence.”
Jonathan Malaya, Assistant Director-General of the National Security Council, said in a statement earlier ABS-CBN In the interview, he said that while the agency’s intelligence unit was still “verifying” Rappler’s reporting, he was “not surprised that these things happened.”
“This is part of China’s malign influence,” he explained.
Australia is one of the Philippines’ few strategic partners and the two countries signed a military agreement before the upgrade of diplomatic relations.
Manila’s pre-Cold War laws
The Philippines’ national security law is outdated — as are laws from before the Cold War.
Año acknowledged that the Philippines’ provisions on treason and espionage were drawn up at a different time — the 1930s, to be exact.
The Revised Penal Code defines espionage as the unauthorized entry into “a warship, fort, naval or military installation, or reservation, to obtain any information, plans, photographs, or other confidential data relating to the defense of the Philippine Islands,” or the disclosure of the contents of such confidential information to a foreign country.
Not surprisingly, existing law does not cover acts intended to maliciously influence or interfere with operations.
That’s why Philippine security agents are set to visit Australia to learn about their existing legislation — and how they are trying to amend it nearly a decade since it was implemented.
In Australia, foreign interference is defined as “conduct by or on behalf of a foreign state; coercive, deceptive, covert or corrupt; or infringing upon Australia’s sovereignty”.
They draw a distinction between interference and mere foreign influence activities, which the Canberra-based Countering Foreign Interference Coordination Centre notes is simply “routine diplomatic influence exercised by governments”.
In Zhang’s case, he worked as a journalist in Manila but was not registered with the Philippine government’s International Press Center (IPC) nor was he a member of the Foreign Correspondents Club of the Philippines (FOCAP), an independently operated organization of Filipino and foreign journalists working for foreign media organizations in the Philippines.
He is also not on the Chinese Embassy’s diplomatic roster.
What’s in the Australian book?
In 2018, former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull approved a package of new laws designed to “prevent foreign interference in the country.” BBC Report.
The move comes as tensions between Beijing and Canberra are at an all-time high.
Turnbull denied at the time that the laws were aimed at China, but Recognition in 2023Long after he left office, Mr Turnbull said the “primary purpose” of the foreign interference laws was to reveal the Chinese Communist Party’s United Front Work Department’s footprint in Australia. Mr Turnbull made the belated disclosure as Australia’s parliament was reviewing foreign interference laws to examine their effectiveness to date.
According to an April 2024 report, Canberra’s foreign interference laws, among other things, establish a public online register of foreign influence. dialogueThe bill also requires Australians to register communications and lobbying activities they conduct on behalf of “foreign principals”.
Shireen Morris and Sarah Sorial from Macquarie University dialogue“But the scheme does nothing to improve transparency or prevent foreign interference. Traffic to the registration website is low and most Australians are probably unaware it exists,” he said.
Both Morris and Sorrial expressed concern that the law would “hinder normal international engagement of Australians”. Academics have also expressed concerns.
The two experts added: “The registration scheme is designed to be ineffective. Why would any foreign actor seeking to covertly undermine Australian democracy voluntarily disclose their activities in order to comply with the very legal system they are trying to subvert?”
The Australian Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security said in its report after reviewing the 2018 law March 2024 Report “Given the significant flaws in the foreign influence transparency scheme, substantive reform is needed if it is to achieve its original intent and justify the compliance burden and resources required for its administration.”
It added: “It is not enough to just tinker with it.”
In December 2023, months after a parliamentary joint committee began reviewing the laws, Australia’s ABC News reported that a Melbourne businessman and “one-time Liberal Party political candidate and member” became the first person to be convicted of violating the country’s foreign interference laws.
Jury Verdict Di Sanh “Sunny” Duong According to the same ABC News report, he was “found guilty of attempting to covertly influence former federal minister Alan Tudge to advance the objectives of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)”. – Rappler.com
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