Mail Online

Tory MP rescued from brothel feared he was victim of a honeytrap by Moscow or Beijing

By Glen Owen and Claire Ellicott

THE Tory MP who rang a Conservative Party manager begging to be extracted from a brothel feared he was the victim of a foreign sting operation, The Mail on Sunday has learned.

As revealed by this newspaper last month, the MP rang a senior Tory at 4am and pleaded: ‘I’m in a brothel. I don’t know how I got here and I can’t find my clothes.’

The MP’s bizarre predicament – which has caused jitters in the party because he represents a seat high on Labour’s target list for the next election – was only resolved when the senior party figure sent someone to ‘extract’ the MP from the brothel in one of London’s seedier neighbourhoods.

He is understood to believe his drinks were spiked because he did not have any recollection of how he came to be there, and even feared

‘I can’t think of anything he could tell the Russians’

he had been targeted in a honeytrap by agents of Russia or China.

The incident has prompted fevered speculation in the Commons about the identity of the MP, whom this newspaper has agreed not to name. But last night, senior party figures expressed scepticism about the honeytrap theory, with one saying: ‘I can’t think of a single useful thing he could tell the Russians or the Chinese.’

It comes after the security services warned that the increase in international tensions with countries such as China and Russia could lead to attempts to target MPs who are thought susceptible to being compromised.

Last week, MPs were advised to remove the email facility from their phones because of the ‘threat of Russian hacking’ – although many have refused.

Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle also recently urged MPs to be on their guard against approaches by what are privately referred to as ‘foreign actors’.

Last year – shortly before the brothel incident – MI5 chief Ken McCallum warned that Russia and China were desperate to gain a foothold in the Commons by targeting MPs and their advisers.

He said: ‘It’s always been the case that people close to the seat of power will be subject to attempted influence. The assertiveness of some of that influencing might be on the rise.’ The agency also revealed that an alleged Chinese operative had infiltrated Parliament to interfere in UK politics.

MI5 said Christine Ching Kui Lee ‘established links’ for the Chinese Communist Party with current and aspiring MPs, giving politicians donations funded by foreign nationals in China and Hong Kong.

One of the most notorious Russian entrapment experts, Anna Chapman, is back in the news over her links to Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates. The Daily Mail revealed that paedophile Jeffrey Epstein threatened to expose Mr Gates over an alleged affair he had with Mila Antonova, a Russian bridge player nearly 30 years his junior. Ms Antonova was an acquaintance of Ms Chapman, a member of a Russian spy ring who was exposed as a sleeper agent and deported from the US in 2010.

Whatever the circumstances of the Tory MP’s predicament, it will add to concerns about the culture at Westminster, where politicians are separated from their families for long periods. Tory MP Charles Walker has described it as ‘a screwdriver that prises the lid off a tin of paint’, adding: ‘If your marriage is weak, it might have failed in ten years – but Parliament will ensure it falls apart in five.’

A source said: ‘The MP seems genuinely baffled about how he came to be in that place. He is convinced he had his drinks spiked, but no one is quite sure. We just had to get him out. The fact that he holds a very marginal seat has made it less of a laughing matter.’

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2023-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-05-28T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://mailonline.pressreader.com/article/281556590201611

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