A soldier with links to far-right groups has admitted handing over and attempting to hand over sensitive military information to a person he thought was a foreign agent.
But the soldier was actually caught in an undercover sting.
He also possessed a video of the 2019 Christchurch Mosque attacks and the mosque attacker’s manifesto, The Great Replacement.
At a court martial at Linton Military Camp near Palmerston North today, the soldier, whose name is suppressed on a temporary basis, admitted one charge each of attempted espionage, dishonestly accessing a computer system and possessing an objectionable publication.
The name of the foreign country the undercover agent said they were representing is suppressed.
The charges
The attempted espionage charge dates to between ,December 5 and 12, 2019 when the soldier attempted to hand information to the undercover agent he thought represented a foreign country.
That information was likely to prejudice the security and defence of New Zealand, according to the wording of the charge.
The soldier handed over phone directories for Linton Military Camp, Burnham Military Camp, Trentham Military Camp and the Hokowhitu campus in Palmerston North, as well as for the Messines Defence Centre. The latter document is classified.
He also attempted to hand over maps and an annotated photo of Linton Military camp; a document setting out Linton’s security vulnerabilities; his own ID card; access codes and information allowing for unauthorised access to Linton and Ohakea air base; and his name and passwords, which allowed unauthorised access to the Defence Force system.
On December 12, 2019, the soldier accessed this system for dishonest reasons.
He obtained property, maps, images and phone directories. This includes a map and phone director of Woodburn air base; a map of an ammunition depot at Kauri Point, Auckland; an aerial photo of a navy ship; and aerial photos and a phone director from Whenuapai air base in Auckland.
On December 16 that year he possessed a recording of the Christchurch mosque attack, which is a restricted publication, and The Great Replacement.
First of its kind
This is the first military prosecution for espionage or attempted espionage. Fifty years ago, in the civilian court, Bill Sutch was acquitted on charges relating to his alleged passing of information to the Russians.
In late 2020, 17 charges under the Armed Forces Discipline Act were laid against the soldier, including espionage and possessing objectionable material. A long period of pre-trial hearings then followed.
The 17 charges were withdrawn in March and replaced with the three charges the soldier initially admitted in March, before confirming those pleas before Judge Kevin Riordan and a military panel today.
The military panel accepted the guilty pleas and will decide the soldier’s sentence.
RNZ has previously reported the soldier, aged 27 at the time of his arrest, was a member of far-right groups the Dominion Movement and Action Zealandia.
