Chinese firm offering to sell access to Donald Trump comes into spotlight after arrest in Mar-a-Lago breach
- The United Nations Chinese Friendship Association, founded by Charles Lee, told clients it could arrange meetings and photo opportunities with politicians
- A Chinese woman, later arrested, said she was at Mar-a-Lago to attend a ‘United Nations Friendship’ event and had been invited by a man named Charles
A criminal case against a Chinese woman accused of gaining unlawful access to US President Donald Trump’s Florida resort has, for the second time in recent weeks, trained the spotlight on an organisation selling clients access to prominent politicians around the world.
According to a criminal complaint, Zhang Yujing told Secret Service agents guarding Trump’s Mar-a-Lago property on Saturday that she was visiting the resort to use the pool, then later told reception staff that she was there to attend a “United Nations Friendship” event, to which she had been invited by a Chinese man identified only as Charles.
Both details appear to point towards the United Nations Chinese Friendship Association (UNCFA), an NGO whose recently deleted website shows numerous photographs of the organisation’s founder, Charles Lee, with prominent public figures, including what the site says is Trump himself and former UN secretary general Ban Ki-moon.
The association, which sells photo-ops and personal meetings with political heavyweights to Chinese clients, says on its defunct website that it is a “civil society” participant of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).
The Chinese Friendship Association does not appear on a UN list of NGO associations registered with DESA.
