The United States and its allies accused China on Monday of a global cyberespionage campaign, mustering an unusually broad coalition of countries for an initiative angrily rejected by Beijing.

The United States was joined by NATO, the European Union, Australia, Britain, Canada, Japan and New Zealand in condemning the spying, which US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said posed "a major threat to our economic and national security".

Simultaneously, the US Department of Justice charged four Chinese nationals - three security officials and one contract hacker - with targeting dozens of companies, universities and government agencies in the United States and abroad.

China's foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said the accusation was...