Bad international spies, extremely lawless government agents, say (9)
I believe the answer is:
officials
'government agents say' is the definition.
(government officials)
'bad international spies extremely lawless' is the wordplay.
'bad' becomes 'off' (I've seen this before).
'international' becomes 'i' (abbreviation eg in IMF).
'spies' becomes 'CIA' (Central Intelligence Agency).
'extremely' means to remove the middle letters (only the extremes of the word are used).
'lawless' with its centre taken out is 'ls'.
'off'+'i'+'cia'+'ls'='OFFICIALS'
(Other definitions for officials that I've seen before include "They're in positions of authority" , "Functionaries, rules administrators" .)