The Chinese embassy in London is a project John Kiriakou treats as a genuine intelligence problem for the United Kingdom, and as the opening move of a much larger programme.
Washington’s refusal
Asked whether the mission is a threat, Kiriakou answered “Yes, I do” and said he had been following the issue. His first point is that the same request had already been made and rejected in the United States. “The Chinese tried the same thing in Washington and we said nothing doing. So they’re kind of split up.”[1]
He describes the resulting arrangement in some detail: “They have a large-ish embassy on a street of embassies. They’re directly across the street from the Israelis. They’re down the street from like the Vietnamese and the Qataris and you know, people like that. But um their housing is in a different place just off Embassy Row in the Kalorama neighborhood of Washington. They’re sort of split up. The trade mission’s in a different building.”[2]
Dispersal, on his account, is the point of the refusal.
London
“In London, they are planning this ginormous embassy. It would be the biggest embassy in the world. And it takes the entire city block in London. There’ve been protests in the streets about this embassy.”[2]
Kiriakou’s account of the British decision is unsympathetic, and he paraphrases the prime minister rather than quoting him: “for whatever reason Keir Starmer said, ‘Now what I I don’t really care what the British people want. Sure, you can have your embassy.’”[3]
The verdict and the forecast
His judgement inverts an old accusation. “talk about the United States used to be accused a lot of of having a spy den in their embassy. This is going to be the mother of all spy dens.”[3]
And he treats London as a template rather than an exception: “mark my words, this is not a one-and-done. The Chinese are going to seek to build embassies like this all over the world. God knows they have the money for it.”[3]