New Zealand accuses Russia, China, Iran of espionage and interference in internal affairs

This is reported by the AR edition.

The report notes that the most notable example of foreign interference is the ongoing work with Chinese communities in New Zealand by people associated with the Chinese Communist Party's intelligence unit. The report indicates that the New Zealand intelligence service is aware of and concerned about Chinese intelligence activities in New Zealand that are aimed at the country.

It also adds that Iran is engaged in societal interference by monitoring Iranian communities and dissident groups in New Zealand.

In addition, the intelligence also linked the war in Ukraine to a number of issues, including increased geopolitical competition, disruption of supply chains and spying on other countries and the spread of disinformation.

"Russia’s international disinformation campaigns have not targeted New Zealand specifically, but have had an impact on the views of some New Zealanders," the report said.

Domestically, intelligence has found that violent extremism continues to pose a threat. The report notes that there were probably some people in New Zealand who intended and could have carried out domestic terrorist attacks, although the intelligence service was not aware of any specific plans.

"We continue to see inflammatory language and violent abuse online targeting a wide variety of people from already marginalized communities," the report said.

On August 11, it was reported that embassies’ staff of four countries in Belarus, in particular during the war in Ukraine, had been monitored for a long time by a group of hackers using hacked local Internet networks.