In 2018, Yanjun Xu and another man who prosecutors say was a Chinese spy traveled 8,000 miles from China to Belgium to meet with an engineer for GE Aviation.
Xu and the other accused intelligence officer, a federal prosecutor said Tuesday in opening statements in Xu’s trial, believed the GE Aviation engineer was bringing a hard drive containing confidential information about commercial jet engines.
The alleged espionage was part of a Chinese government policy to steal trade secrets from aviation companies, Assistant U.S. Attorney Emily Glatfelter told jurors. She said China wanted to build its own jet engine modeled after GE Aviation’s, which she called the most successful in the world.
China relies on spies, she said, “to steal what they cannot develop themselves.”
When FBI agents and Belgian authorities arrested Xu and the other accused spy, the two had multiple cellphones, photos of the engineer and his family and thousands of dollars in U.S. currency wrapped in brown envelopes, Glatfelter said. Xu also had been using an alias, she said.
Information on at least one of the phones, she said, was erased remotely after law enforcement confiscated it. That showed Chinese intelligence was involved, she said.
The GE Aviation engineer was not charged. For several months, he had been cooperating with the FBI. Glatfelter said agents used his email and messaging apps to communicate with Xu and others.
Glatfelter said Xu, 41, was a deputy division director for the Ministry of State Security, China’s intelligence agency. Beginning in late-2013, she said he worked with other intelligence officers to obtain trade secrets from aviation companies. Among them: Honeywell Aerospace and Safran, a French company that makes aircraft engines.
