As Foreign Secretary David Lammy visits China this week, there are reasons to be concerned that the new Labour Government has learned no lessons from the past – and signs that Operation Kowtow is back.
That he is visiting Beijing is not in itself necessarily a bad thing. China is such a significant global power – economically, politically and militarily – that it is not wise to disengage. There are legitimate questions to ask about the timing, and whether a visit at his level of seniority might have been better to make further down the line, but the key question is not whether we engage, but how, on whose terms and with what objectives.
In August the Prime Minister had a call with Xi Jinping in which he reportedly told the Chinese leader he wanted the UK and China to pursue closer economic ties and “shared collaboration”. Passing reference was made to areas of disagreement, including Ukraine, Hong Kong and human rights, which would be addressed “when necessary” – almost as an addendum.
That was followed last month by Peter Mandelson’s speech in Hong Kong, in which he blamed the previous Conservative government for a deterioration in Sino-British relations and said that the new Labour government wished to ‘recreate the strategic dialogue that Britain has had with China in the past’, after ‘many years of a very poor, deteriorating relationship’. That sounds dangerously close to David Cameron’s failed ‘golden era’ – which Lord Mandelson first initiated.
The Government’s decision to pause the Free Speech Act, aimed partially at tackling Chinese interference in our universities, hand the Chagos Islands over to Beijing’s ally Mauritius, u-turn on recognising the genocide of the Uyghurs and – last week – pressure Taiwan’s former president Tsai Ing-wen to postpone a planned visit to the UK all point in the direction of a softening towards Beijing. If so, this is profoundly misguided.
Lord Mandelson’s diagnosis of why UK-China relations have become more tense is completely wrong-headed. It was not the behaviour of the last government – which pursued at least five ministerial visits in the past 18 months – that caused tensions, but Beijing’s.
Don’t forget that in the past five years Xi Jinping’s regime has torn up its promises under an international agreement, the Sino-British Joint Declaration, and dismantled Hong Kong’s freedoms, autonomy and the rule of law. It has also stepped up its bellicose aggression towards Taiwan.
Remember that Xi’s persecution of the Uyghurs has been recognised as a genocide by both the Trump and Biden administrations, several parliaments including our own House of Commons, and an independent tribunal chaired by the barrister who prosecuted Slobodan Milosevic, Sir Geoffrey Nice KC.
There was also Covid-19, which Xi’s regime lied about, tried to hide and then unleashed upon the world, destroying hundreds of millions of lives and livelihoods around the world. And Beijing has been backing Vladimir Putin’s illegal war in Ukraine.
On top of that, our security services have consistently highlighted China’s threats to our national security, through espionage, infiltration, influence and intimidation campaigns. Seven British Parliamentarians have been sanctioned by China, Chinese agents have been spying in Parliament and China has hacked the Ministry of Defence and beaten up peaceful Hong Kongers protesting at the Chinese consulate in Manchester.
I am much further down the food-chain, but even I have been the target of Beijing’s bullying, having been denied entry to Hong Kong, threatened with a jail sentence and received intimidatory letters at my home. Some of my neighbours and even my mother has received threatening post. Early this year I was named as a collaborator in the trial of Hong Kong pro-democracy entrepreneur Jimmy Lai, founder of the Apple Daily which was forced to close in 2021.
This is not the conduct of a government with whom we should be friends. It is the behaviour of a thuggish, criminal regime which poses a grave threat to our security and our values.
So Mr Lammy should be clear-sighted and robust this week. He should look his Chinese counterparts in the eye and demand an end to the Uyghur genocide, the intensifying atrocities in Tibet and the crackdown on Christians and other religious believers, dissidents and human rights defenders across the country. He should warn of the consequences for any escalation in threats to Taiwan, in an effort to deter a war that would engulf the world. And he must insist on the release of political prisoners in Hong Kong before any closer economic ties could begin to be considered.
In particular, he must demand the release of my friend, 76 year-old Mr Lai, a British citizen, held in solitary confinement for 23 hours and 10 minutes per day. Concerns are growing about Mr Lai’s health, as he is denied access to independent medical care and has limited human contact or access to daylight, with less than an hour a day for restricted exercise. As a devout Catholic, perhaps the greatest cruelty is that he is being denied Holy Communion. As a professing Christian, this is surely an injustice Mr Lammy should be outraged about.
If Mr Lammy’s visit is merely a warm-up act for Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ expected trade mission early next year, or an affirmation of Lord Mandelson’s dreadful Hong Kong speech last month, or confirmation of the goodwill expressed by Sir Keir Starmer in his call with Xi, then we are on a slippery slope back to appeasement which will end in disaster. If, on the other hand, his visit delivers some warning shots to the apparatchiks in Beijing, and results in a more robust conclusion to the new government’s long-awaited audit of China policy, and Mr Lai’s release, then I won’t be against it. It’s in Mr Lammy’s hands – and on his conscience.
Benedict Rogers is co-founder of Hong Kong Watch and author of “The China Nexus: Thirty Years In and Around the Chinese Communist Party’s Tyranny”
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