4 US officials break into Chinese consulate in Houston after staff departed premises

Tension between Beijing and Washington is threatening to boil over after four United States officials reportedly broke into the Chinese consulate in the city of Houston and entered the diplomatic mission.

Reports say the US officials wearing face masks stormed the premises on Saturday and forced the door of the building open, shortly after staff at the Chinese consulate vacated the building on the orders of the government.

The 72-hour deadline for the Houston mission’s closure ended at 4 pm local time on Friday, and Chinese officials were seen loading large sacks of objects and documents onto U-Haul trucks and tossing more into Dumpster bins.

Einar Tangen, political analyst and adviser to the Chinese government, called the US officials’ entry into the Houston consulate “highly unusual” and “against diplomatic protocol”.

“There are now concerns that perhaps this is a ‘Trojan Horse’ situation where they go in and try to find incriminating documents that they will use as a political campaign to vilify China,” he told Al Jazeera from Beijing.

READ ALSO: China rages as US orders closure of its consulate in Houston

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had called the Houston consulate a “hub of spying and intellectual property theft” on Thursday – a claim Chinese officials dismissed as “malicious slander”.

Beijing then ordered the US’s Chengdu consulate shut, saying the move was a “legitimate and necessary response to the unreasonable measures” by Washington.

Foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin later told reporters that some US staff in the Chengdu consulate “were engaged in activities outside of their capacity, interfered in China’s internal affairs, and endangered China’s security and interests”.

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