Lelling, in a live-streamed discussion at a Washington, D.C., conference about the government's China Initiative to confront economic malfeasance, spoke about his office's recent indictment of a Harvard professor and two Chinese nationals and researchers accused of working with the Chinese government.

H/T: American Military News

Speaking at the Center for Strategic & International Studies' China Initiative Conference on Thursday, US Attorney Andrew Lelling warned that Chinese government agents in Boston are a national security threat, especially within academia.

"More concerning to us, and we have leads on these kinds of cases in Boston, is agents of the Chinese government … come to the United States to exercise some ideological control over Chinese nationals who may be operating completely in good faith who are here to study, to learn in our schools or work at our institutions," Lelling said.

Watch the full panel discussion of distinguished US Attorney's from around the country below.

Several high-profile arrests involving possible Chinese espionage have occurred in Boston of the last few months.

In late January, Charles M. Lieber, the chair of Harvard's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, was charged with lying to the Department of Defense about his work for a Chinese-run talent recruitment program, which allegedly paid $50,000 per month for his work.

Stolen Research: Chinese Scientist Is Accused of Smuggling Lab Samples



Zaosong Zheng, a promising cancer researcher, confessed that he had planned to take the stolen samples to Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hospital, and publish the results under his own name. https://t.co/uI0qSE1Sy4 — Karol Cummins (@karolcummins) January 2, 2020