Secret Russian intelligence report reveals deep suspicion of China

It says Beijing trying to recruit Russian spies and get military tech, among other threats

- Jacob Judah, Paul Sonne and Anton Troianovski

In public, President Vladimir Putin of Russia says his country's growing friendship with China is unshakeable - a strategic military and economic collaboration that has entered a golden era.

But in the corridors of Lubyanka, the headquarters of Russia's domestic security agency known as the FSB, a secretive intelligence unit refers to the Chinese as "the enemy".

This unit, which has not previously been disclosed, has warned that China is a serious threat to Russian security. Its officers say that Beijing is increasingly trying to recruit Russian spies and get its hands on sensitive military technology, at times by luring disaffected Russian scientists.

The intelligence officers say that China is spying on the Russian military's operations in Ukraine to learn about Western weapons and warfare.

They fear that Chinese academics are laying the groundwork to make claims on Russian territory.

And they have warned that Chinese intelligence agents are carrying out espionage in the Arctic using mining firms and university research centres as cover.

The threats are laid out in an eight-page internal FSB planning document, obtained by The New York Times, that sets priorities for fending off Chinese espionage.

The document is undated, raising the possibility that it is a draft, though it appears from context to have been written in late 2023 or early 2024.

Ares Leaks, a cyber-crime group, obtained the document but did not say how it did so.

That makes definitive authentication impossible, but the Times shared the report with six Western intelligence agencies, all of which assessed it to be authentic.

The document gives the most detailed behind-the-scenes view to date of Russian counter-intelligence's thinking about China.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow's new bond with Beijing has shifted the global balance of power.