Former CIA officer sentenced to 10 years in prison as a spy for China

Alexander Yuk Ching Ma, 71, was arrested in August 2020 after he admitted to an FBI undercover agent that he had sold the secrets to US, China, to Telegrafi.

Ma, an American naturalised citizen born in Hong Kong, worked for the CIA from 1982 to 1989. He kept working for the FBI later in his career.

Part of his plea agreement, says he must co-operate with prosecutors “for the rest of his life, including submission to deportations by US government agencies”.

The plea agreement requires that he undergo polygraphic tests during those collections, according to the Associated Press news agency.

At a hearing Wednesday, US government lawyers told the court that he was an accomplice and has already participated in the “numerous interviews with government agents”.

Officials say I cooperated with a relative, who was also CIA agent, to give secret intelligence officers employed at the Shanghai State Security Bureau.

A meeting in Hong Kong was recorded in video and shows Ma, counting $50,000 in cash on secrets they shared, federal prosecutors say.

While living in Hawaii in 2004, he took a job at the FBI office in Honolulu as a languager with a contract.

Prosecutors said Wednesday, The FBI, already aware of his spying activities “anghe Ma as part of a fraud to monitor and investigate his activities and contacts”.

According to the AP, the unidentified associate was Ma's brother, who died before being prosecuted.

In a court in Hawaii on Wednesday, Ma was imprisoned for 10 years, as agreed with prosecutors, followed by five years of supervised release.