Quotes from China state secret agency reports on Rio Tinto

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's National Administration for the Protection of State Secrets has accused mining multinational Rio Tinto of engaging in commercial spying over 6 years, demanding tough measures to end loss of lucrative business information.

Here are quotes from the two Chinese-language reports about the case from a magazine published by the Administration and issued on its website (www.baomi.org).

Author Jiang Ruqin in an article headlined "What does the Rio Tinto case reveal?" writes :

"The large amount of intelligence and data from our country's steel sector found on Rio Tinto's computers and the massive damage to our national economic security and interests are plainly obvious. The economic espionage in this case involved winning over and buying off, prying out intelligence, routing one by one, and gaining things by deceit over 6 years. This virtually blackmailed Chinese steel businesses to pay the heavy price of an extra 700 billion yuan or more for imported iron ore."

"The Rio Tinto case of the foreigner comprador, Hu Shitai colluding with the senior ranks of some major steel enterprises...is in essence the same, showing that these are not merely individual cases, but the tip of the iceberg. If they are not swiftly investigated and dealt with, this will be disastrous for Another author Luo Jianghua, writes in report headlined "Secrets protection by state-owned businesses demands urgent strengthening" :

"In recent years, many economic spies in our country have acquired advanced technology, information about important negotiations and a range of other state economic, technological secrets and commercial secrets, inflicting major economic damage on China."

"The Rio Tinto spying case has again sounded the alarm over secrets protection by our country's state-owned enterprises and corporations, forcing us to a thorough awareness that their protection of secrets must only be strengthened and cannot weaken. As one central leader sharply pointed out, protecting the secrets of the Party and the state, including secrets in the economic and technological spheres, is a major concern for the interests of the nation, state and people."

"Interest groups from abroad generally acquire economic intelligence in China by using their offices and people in China to engage in passing on benefits, policy lobbying and collection of commercial intelligence."

(Reporting by Chris Buckley; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)