China link to Renault car spy plot

French intelligence services are looking into China's possible role in an industrial espionage scandal at carmaker Renault that a senior minister has said involved "economic warfare."

Three Renault executives, including one member of its management committee, were suspended on Monday in the case, which has prompted the French government to warn of an "overall risk" to French industry.

The executives are suspected of leaking information related to the high-profile electric vehicle programme, a key plank of the carmaker's strategy in which, together with its Japanese partner Nissan, it is investing billions of euros.

A government source said French president Nicolas Sarkozy's office had ordered the investigation. Renault, which declined to comment, is 15 per cent owned by the French state.

"The Elyse has charged the DCRI (intelligence services] with an investigation. It is following a Chinese lead," the source said.

Relations between France and China hit a low two years ago when Mr Sarkozy criticised Beijing's policy on Tibet, prompting Chinese citizens to call for boycotts of French products.

But a recent visit by Chinese president Hu Jintao to Paris helped forge closer ties, as France seeks to secure Chinese support for its ambitious G20 agenda to explore reforms of the global monetary system.

Bernard Carayon, an MP in Mr Sarkozy's ruling UMP party, said that France needed tougher laws against industrial espionage to defend itself in a "war" against emerging economies hungry for new technology,

"This is a war which does not stop worsening and which has intensified even more with the emergence of industrial powers like China," said Mr Carayon, who is drafting a law on the protection of economic information.

This is not the first time France's car industry has been hit by information leaks.

In 2007, a Chinese student doing a work placement at car parts maker Valeo was given a prison sentence for obtaining confidential documents from the automaker. A French tribunal stopped short of an industrial espionage verdict, instead finding she had "abused trust".

China has a long record of industrial espionage, rivalled, say critics, only by France's.