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Alexander Csgero will be eligible for parole as early as next month after being sentenced to three-and-a-half years behind bars for reckless foreign interference.
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He is the first Australian to be sentenced for the offence, which relates to reports the Sydney businessman compiled for two suspected Chinese spies - who contacted him via Linkedin - while he was working in Shanghai.
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The district court judge judge took into account that Csergo had spent more than 600 days in custody prior to being sentenced.
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Csergo prepared reports, upon request and in return for payment, about topics including lithium mining, the change in the German government, defence, the Quad alliance and AUKUS.
The prosecution told jurors he believed they worked for a Chinese intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security (MSS), and was reckless as to whether his conduct would support foreign intelligence activities.
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A District Court jury found the 58-year-old guilty in March, after hearing weeks of evidence about Csergo’s communication and meetings with two people he knew as “Ken” and “Evelyn” between 2021 and 2023, when he returned to Sydney.
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Judge Craig Smith found that the offending effectively took place between May or June 2022 and December 2022.
He said Csergo’s subjective awareness of his situation shifted around May 2022, when he was asked to prepare a defence report that was “materially different” from his previous work.
In WeChat messages to Csergo, specific topics of interest were identified, including “China spy”, “anything about China in ASIO”, and strategy, targets, tactics, methods and technology.
Csergo warned Ken that they needed to be “careful” and said, “we don’t want to find ourselves being questioned by any governments”.
He also said that one of his contacts had “strongly warned” him against what Ken had requested.
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[Edit to include the archived link.]