Foreign agent

A foreign agent is any person or entity actively carrying out the interests of a foreign principal while located in another host country, generally outside the protections offered to those working in their official capacity for a diplomatic mission.

Foreign agents may be citizens of the host country. In contemporary English, the term has a generally pejorative connotation, reinforced by its use in the US laws aimed to curb the foreign influence.[1] A covert foreign agent, also known as a secret agent of a foreign government, may in some countries be presumed to be engaging in espionage.

  1. ^ Harvard Law Review 1965, p. 632: "The continued use of the statute [FARA] as a subversive control act means that the term "foreign agent" will continue to carry pejorative connotations."