The Chancellor courting China signals a craven betrayal of British interests and human rights
Ben Keith writes for The Telegraph. Click here to view the article on the Telegraph website.
You may or may not remember the time Rachel Reeves voiced fears about the UK being too dependent on China. “I think we are still too over-reliant on China,” she said back in early 2023. “National security has always got to come first.”
However, fast forward to early 2025 and the Chancellor appears to be taking a very different approach. Reeves may have often voted in support of laws that advance human rights, but this failed to deter her from visiting the ruthless authoritarian state last month. In her much-hyped speech laying out her plans to turn Britain’s struggling economy around, she bragged that her visit to Beijing had secured agreements worth £600 million to the UK. But the question remains: At what cost?
The list of human rights abuses perpetrated by the People’s Party is both lengthy and indefensible. From the grave persecution and reprisals faced by government critics and those who fight for human rights to the stringent censorship of Chinese citizens and quashing of freedom of expression and association, repression in China is only intensifying.
State-sanctioned abuse against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang persists – as does the continued repression of pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong. Forced organ harvesting perpetrated against religious minorities remains one of the most barbaric and sickening examples of abuse imaginable.
Moreover, there is the espionage committed by agents of the Chinese state around the world. The Chinese embassy in London recently urged the UK to “stop creating trouble” after Yang Tengbo – a businessman accused of spying on us on their behalf was barred from the country. The controversy unsurprisingly revived demands for the UK to classify China as a national security threat. However, with Reeves apparently cosying up to them, it feels like we are moving in the opposite direction.
Yes, Reeves is right to point out that China is both our fourth-largest single trading partner and the world’s second-largest economy. But this neither negates nor alleviates the grave threat to national security that China presents.
Reeves has promised to challenge China, saying she raised during her recent trip “issues around human rights, forced labour, Hong Kong and Jimmy Lai, and around the sanctioning of parliamentarians”.
But one cannot help but wonder what truly goes on behind doors in such negotiations - and whether the chancellor or the wider UK government takes China’s track record of human rights violations as seriously as they should. UK leaders have long excelled at paying homage to democratic principles and human rights but this so often amounts to lip service and empty promises.
Since taking office last July, Labour has made no secret of its eagerness to improve our relationship with China. But such efforts have also been marked by an apparent dearth of consternation and anger at the regime’s grisly catalogue of human rights abuses.
Take the weaponisation of Interpol red notices. Red Notices are designed to be alerts to track down serious criminals but the mechanisms have been weaponised by Beijing as a tool of transnational repression. In turn, they have been wielded to target individuals who have escaped the regime’s repression - with human rights defenders and political dissidents among them.
Such persecution is at times deeply rooted in ideology and those Chinese who have become successful in business and subsequently “westernised” have found themselves punished. Being targeted by a Red Notice is life-changing - your assets can be frozen, you can face travel bans, and most irrevocably of all, your reputation can be profoundly damaged. Such harm can outlive the notice being withdrawn because it is found to be unwarranted.
To sum up, China’s sophisticated manipulation of Interpol’s system of red notices is unparalleled - and its misuse poses a far-reaching danger to international law enforcement. Its successful infiltration of a global institution like Interpol is a tell-tale sign of the authoritarian regime’s swelling power and control. The UK government – which gives substantial funding to Interpol – must demand reform of the institution.
There is also the issue of cyberattacks. In 2020, the US Department of Justice announced criminal charges against Chinese nationals after a campaign of attacks aimed at governments and businesses.
If the UK government remains intent on pursuing economic ties with China, it will have to keep its eyes wide open. Unsurprisingly, concerns have been raised about the security risk posed by China’s plans to build a new 600,000-square-foot embassy in London – both Foreign Secretary David Lammy and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper have signalled their support for the mega-embassy.
But the threat which China presents does not just exist in cyberspace, with Chinese nationals even assaulted here in the UK. Take the case of Consul General Zheng Xiyuan assaulting a Hong Kong protester inside the grounds of the Chinese consulate in Manchester back in 2022.
Reeves’s opening to China signals a craven betrayal of human rights and of British interests.
Ben Keith is a leading barrister specialising in cross-border and international cases. He deals with all aspects of extradition, immigration, human rights, mutual legal assistance, Interpol, financial crime and international law, including sanctions. He represents governments, political and military leaders, high net worth individuals, human rights defenders and business leaders in the most sensitive cases. He is a leading authority on the removal of Interpol Red Notices for worldwide clients. He edits the Red Notice Monitor blog.
Ben has extensive experience of appellate proceedings before the Administrative and Divisional Courts, Civil and Criminal Divisions of the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court as well as applications and appeals to the European Court of Human Rights and the United Nations.
Ben has significant expertise in post-soviet states, as well the Middle East and the Far East.
He is ranked in Chambers and Partners as a star leader in the field of extradition at the London Bar and in The Legal 500 as a Tier 1 leading individual in extradition. Ben is also ranked in Chambers and Partners in the field of immigration and in its Financial Crime: High Net Worth Individuals rankings. He is recognised in The Spears’ 500 2024 Guide as a ‘Recommended Immigration Law Barrister’.
