The British Royal Prosecutor's Office (CPS) announced in mid-September that it had withdrawn allegations of spying on former parliamentary researcher Christopher Cash and researcher Christopher Berry, a case that lasted for more than two years and continued to ferment after the "evidence failed to reach the trial threshold."CPS Attorney General Parkinson said on 7 that the UK Labour government has denied the interference.

The case began in March 2023. According to reports from the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and The Guardian, anti-terrorist police arrested Cash and Berry on suspicion of violating the Official Secrets Act of 1911 and accused the two of collecting and transmitting information for China that was so-called "detrimental to Britain's national security and interests" between December 2021 and February 2023. After the two men were acquitted, individual British MPs questioned the trial of the case, claiming that withdrawing the case could "make Parliament vulnerable to threats of espionage." British media also followed up on the hype. The Sunday Times "broke the news" that senior government officials, including British Prime Minister's National Security Adviser Powell, intervened, resulting in the aborted case.

The press secretary at 10 Downing Street said on Friday that ¡°no claims about the government¡¯s seizure of evidence, withdrawal of witnesses, or restriction of witnesses¡¯ citation of specific evidence are true.¡±

According to BBC News, CPS Attorney General Parkinson insisted that the CPS decision was not affected by any ¡°external pressure.¡± In a letter to the House Home Affairs Committee and the Chairman of the Judicial Committee on July 7, he wrote: ¡°We have worked for months to obtain the evidence. Despite more witness testimony, these testimony do not indicate that ¡®China poses a threat to the national security of the United Kingdom when a crime occurs¡¯; by the end of August 2025, we realized that we could not obtain this evidence.¡±

Several British media outlets have pointed to the government in reporting the letter, saying that the withdrawal of the case was "accused of the British government failing to label China as a threat", while linking the matter to the Labour government's desire to restart British-Chinese relations. while British Prime Minister Stammer said on 7th that the government's description of China cannot be modified in a retrospective manner, the case must be based on the position of the previous government on China, "it is not a political issue, but a legal issue."

Li Guanjie, a think tank researcher at the British Studies Center of Shanghai Institute of Global Governance and Regional Countries of Shanghai International Studies University and a distinguished expert at the European Union Studies Center, told the Global Times reporter on the 8th that some forces in the United Kingdom have repeatedly hyped the withdrawn China-related espionage case, not simply out of national security concerns. They tried to amplify the internal contradiction between the Labour Party's national security and China policy, so as to form an advantage in public opinion and win the support of more voters. Domestic populist forces in Britain still have a lot of room for activities, and they will continue to speculate on China issues in the future. (Ding Yazhi)