Ukraine said Monday it has sentenced a “foreign citizen” to six years in prison for attempting to steal technical documents on a Ukrainian-made aircraft and pass them to a foreign intelligence service.
The Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) announced the decision on Monday without disclosing the man’s nationality or the foreign intelligence service involved.
However, Kyiv Post determined that the blurred documents shown in an accompanying photo included two passports issued by the People’s Republic of China (PRC), along with other materials featuring Chinese characters and UnionPay bank cards, a Chinese payment system.
According to the PGO, the accused entered Ukraine in 2022 and acted “as an agent of a foreign intelligence service and carried out espionage activities.”
In 2024, the man was said to have contacted an engineer from a state-owned enterprise and offered the latter $1 million for the technical documentation on an unspecified domestic aircraft.
However, upon receiving the data on a flash drive from the engineer with files marked as “secret,” the accused was arrested by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).
The enterprise and the aircraft model in question, as well as the timing of the arrest, remain unclear.
The man has been found guilty and is sentenced to six years in prison for espionage.
The SBU declined to comment when Kyiv Post asked for confirmation on the man’s nationality.
The SBU has announced several recent arrests of foreign spies working for Moscow, including an Eastern European man dispatched to Ukraine and a former British military trainer who offered his services to Russia. However, cases involving Chinese nationals have been rare.
In July, the SBU reported the arrests of two PRC nationals – a father and son – for allegedly trying to steal technical documentation on the production of Ukraine’s Neptune missile.
It is unclear if the latest verdict is related to the Neptune case.