Tory fury at Boris Johnson's attempt to woo China with new trade talks

Tory fury at Boris Johnson’s attempt to ‘kowtow’ to China with new trade talks despite Beijing stifling democracy in Hong Kong and targeting party MPs critical of human rights abuses against Uighurs

• PM personally instructed officials to restart talks that stalled in 2018, reports say
•  Xi regime faces global condemnation over Uighur human rights abuses 
• Has also clashed with UK over crushing of democracy in Hong Kong 

Tory MPs have accused Boris Johnson of trying to ‘kowtow’ to China after it emerged he is seeking new trade talks with Beijing.

They reacted with astonishment that he is seeking to warm relations at a time when the Communist regime faces global condemnation over human rights abuses while flexing military muscles.

The Prime Minister personally instructed the Department for International Trade to restart talks that stalled in 2018, the Political website reported.

It is the latest row involving China to engulf the PM, a self-confessed Sinophile. His new director of communications, Guto Harri, is a former lobbyist for telecoms firm Huawei, which has been banned from involvement in the UK’s 5G network over espionage fears.  

Former Tory leader and minister Sir Iain Duncan-Smith told Politico: ‘If this government decides that they are going to kowtow to China by going over there and begging them to trade I have to tell you that they can think again.

The Prime Minister personally instructed the Department for International Trade to restart talks that stalled in 2018, the Political website reported.

Former Tory leader and minister Sir Iain Duncan-Smith told Politico: ‘If this government decides that they are going to kowtow to China by going over there and begging them to trade I have to tell you that they can think again’

Last March Beijing slapped sanctions on MPs and academics critical of the Xi regime.

‘I make no bones about this: I will not let it rest if we start now, amid all the evidence of genocide, brutality, crackdowns on peaceful protesters, and go traipsing along there as though nothing happened. There’s no good them telling us that they’re going to clean up their act — because they never do.’

Last March Beijing slapped sanctions on MPs and academics critical of the Xi regime. 

The Government reacted with fury as nine China hawks – plus four UK institutions – were targeted by the Communist regime for speaking out on its human rights abuses.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he stood ‘firmly’ behind them over the tit-for-tat move, which came four days after Britain, the US, Canada and the European Union placed sanctions on Chinese officials deemed responsible for human rights abuses against Uighur Muslims in the country’s autonomous Xinjiang.

Then foreign secretary Dominic Raab announced a package of travel bans and asset freezes against four senior officials and the state-run Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps Public Security Bureau (XPCC PSB).

He said the abuse of Uighur Muslims was ‘one of the worst human rights crises of our time’ and the global community ‘cannot simply look the other way’.

But China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Mr Raab’s move was ‘based on nothing but lies and disinformation, flagrantly breaches international law and basic norms governing international relations, grossly interferes in China’s internal affairs, and severely undermines China-UK relations’. The Ministry said it had sanctioned nine people and four British institutions ‘that maliciously spread lies and disinformation’.

Tory MPs Sir Iain, Neil O’Brien, Tim Loughton, Nusrat Ghani and chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee Tom Tugendhat were sanctioned, along with crossbench peer Lord Alton, Labour’s Baroness Kennedy, barrister Geoffrey Nice and academic Jo Smith Finley.

The two countries have also clashed over attacks on democracy in Hong Kong, the former British territory. Critics say that the ‘one country, two systems’ deal done before it was handed back 25 years ago has been ignored as the mainland tried to extend its political influence.

It prompted the UK to offer sanctuary to citizens fleeing the city. 

And last month after MI5 accused British lawyer Christine Lee, 58, of covertly targeting British politicians for the Chinese Communist Party.

China hawk Tory MP Bob Seely, who sits on the Foreign Affairs Committee, added: ‘We need to deal with the world as it is, not as we would want it to be, but I don’t understand why we are so keen to have high-level ministerial contacts when the Chinese government is sanctioning U.K. MPs, when it has recognized the Falklands as being Argentinian, when it is dismantling Hong Kong’s democratic government.’ 

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