One of the detained Chinese spies is a 24-year-old former student at a technical university in Kiev. He was expelled in 2023 for failing, but remained in Ukraine.

The second detainee is his father, who periodically visits Kyiv to"personally coordinate the work of his son's agency," the SBU said in a statement.

To obtain the"Neptun" documentation, a former Chinese student tried to recruit a Ukrainian citizen who had been involved in the development of the latest weapons.

Ukrainian counterintelligence discovered the spy early in his activities, but only arrested him when he was handed over the secret documents. His father was later detained, who was supposed to hand over the documents to Chinese intelligence.