French officials say they have found that the Chinese embassies are trying to undermine Rafale sales by persuading countries that have already ordered the jets, notably Indonesia, not to buy them and instead choose Chinese-made fighters.

A French intelligence service says China has used its embassies to promote claims that Chinese-made Pakistani warplanes outperformed French Rafale jets during India-Pakistan clashes in May

This has revealed Chinese ambition to penetrate the tier 1 weapons market, while the operation was employed by the DG ISPR to promote Chinese weaponrycordin