I feel that the word conspiracy is not helping to bring clarity to the discussion. Covert operations are by definition conspirations but that's not what people generally mean when they use the word conspiracy so let's just avoid using a word that might muddy the discourse unnecessary.

Both the Chinese and USA governments engaged (or have been accused of engaging) in unlawful kidnapping of their own (and foreign) nationals from foreign countries over the last decades.

So I'm not sure how one can dismiss the possibility that this is indeed one of such cases.