Yang Tengbo: Alleged Chinese spy with links to Prince Andrew breaks silence after High Court ruling

Yang Tengbo, the alleged Chinese spy banned from the UK and linked to the Duke of York, said he has “done nothing wrong or unlawful”, adding in a statement that the “widespread description of me as a ‘spy’ is entirely untrue”.

The alleged Chinese spy who has been barred from entering the UK has finally been named as an anonymity order was lifted.

He was previously only referred to as H6 due to a court order protecting his identity.

The statement said he had voluntarily waived his right to anonymity.

Yang said: “Due to the high level of speculation and misreporting in the media and elsewhere, I have asked my legal team to disclose my identity. I have done nothing wrong or unlawful and the concerns raised by the Home Office against me are ill-founded. The widespread description of me as a ‘spy’ is entirely untrue.

“This is why I applied for a review of the Home Office decision in the first place, and why I am seeking permission to appeal the SIAC decision. It is also why an order extending my anonymity up to the point of determination of the appeal process was granted.

“I have been excluded from seeing most of the evidence that was used against me under a process which is widely acknowledged by SIAC practitioners as inherently unfair: decisions are made based on secret evidence and closed proceedings, which has been described as ‘taking blind shots at a hidden target’.

“On their own fact finding, even the three judges in this case concluded that there was ‘not an abundance of evidence’ against me, their decision was ‘finely balanced’, and there could be an ‘innocent explanation’ for my activities. This has not been reported in the media.

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“The political climate has changed, and unfortunately, I have fallen victim to this. When relations are good, and Chinese investment is sought, I am welcome in the UK. When relations sour, an anti-China stance is taken, and I am excluded.

“I am an independent self-made entrepreneur and I have always aimed to foster partnerships and build bridges between East and West. I have dedicated my professional life in the UK to building links between British and Chinese businesses. My activities have played a part in bringing hundreds of millions of pounds of investment into the UK.

“I built my private life in the UK over two decades and love the country as my second home. I would never do anything to harm the interests of the UK.”

Yang, the former chair of consultancy firm Hampton Group, had been in the UK for almost two decades.

Court documents said Yang had split his time between China and the UK and told officials he considered the UK to be his second home.

In 2021, he was first stopped by counter-terrorism services and ordered to surrender his devices and in March 2023, he was banned entry into the UK by the then-Home Secretary Suella Braverman.

Tengbo – who has been described as a “close confidant” of Andrew – then brought a case to the Special Immigration Appeals Commission (SIAC) after he was banned. The judges were told that officials claimed he had been in a position to generate relationships between influential UK figures and senior Chinese officials “that could be leveraged for political interference purposes”.

In a statement on Friday, Andrew’s office said he had stopped all contact with the man, whom he had met through “official channels” with “nothing of a sensitive nature ever discussed”.

According to court documents, the businessman was so close to the Duke of York that he was authorised to act on his behalf in an international financial initiative in China.