China's embassy in Wellington rejected New Zealand's latest national-security assessment, saying it contained multiple false allegations. The response followed publication of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service's fourth Security Threat Environment report.
The NZSIS assessment identifies China as the only state pursuing espionage in New Zealand at scale. It also describes China as the most active among several countries engaged in foreign interference, placing Beijing at the centre of the agency's warning about threats to national security.
The embassy said those findings either portrayed ordinary exchanges and cooperation as espionage or interference, or were fabricated without a factual basis. Its rebuttal denied both the scale of intelligence activity attributed to China and the characterization of bilateral engagement as a security threat.
Beijing instead emphasized mutual benefits in trade, tourism, international education and exchanges between people. The embassy credited New Zealand's Chinese community with a positive role and said China's unilateral visa-free policy had encouraged more New Zealanders to visit, strengthening goodwill and support for the relationship.
The Chinese statement also challenged the timing of the report. It alleged that the assessment formed part of a new international campaign to attack and vilify China, and suggested the document itself might be a product of foreign interference.
The embassy accused anti-China forces of trying to divide the two societies, create a chilling effect, weaken public trust and obstruct bilateral cooperation. It warned that serving as a pawn for those forces would backfire and argued that manufacturing distractions in foreign relations would not resolve New Zealand's domestic problems.
Despite the confrontation, the embassy said China valued its relationship with New Zealand and remained prepared to expand exchanges and practical cooperation. The dispute therefore leaves Wellington's intelligence judgment and Beijing's categorical denial side by side, with security suspicion colliding directly with a relationship both governments also frame in economic and social terms.
