Dong is, or was, a longtime official in China’s Ministry of State Security (MSS), also known as the Guoanbu. His publicly available background indicates that he was responsible for the Ministry’s counterintelligence efforts in China, i.e., spy-catching, since being promoted to vice minister in April 2018. If the stories are true, Dong would be the highest-level defector in the history of the People’s Republic of China. A half dozen experts on Chinese intelligence queried by SpyTalk said they had no information to share on Dong’s alleged defection. Under “personnel developments,” it notes the corruption investigation against another former vice minister, Ma Jian, who was sentenced to life in prison in 2018.
