Labour tells China it will act on interference in UK democracy

Catherine West, the shadow Asia minister, travelled to Beijing last week as part of a delegation of British MPs for meetings with senior Chinese government figures and businesses.

On Thursday and Friday, West attended meetings with Wang Huning, one of Xi Jinping’s appointees to China’s powerful seven-member politburo, and the vice-foreign minister, Deng Li.

“That’s why it was so important for me to visit Beijing ahead of the election, and meet with senior Chinese leaders, to put on record our concerns about human rights, national security, and interference in our democracy and make it clear this is something we will act on in government.”

West was part of a cross-party delegation of MPs including the Conservatives Richard Graham, who chairs the all-party parliamentary group on China, Mark Logan, Geoffrey Clifton-Brown and Jonathan Djanogly.

The delegation was led by David Lidington, the former senior Tory cabinet minister who is now honorary president of the Great Britain China Centre, an FCDO arm’s-length body that conducts dialogue with Beijing.

As well as security issues, West raised Labour’s human rights concerns, including the treatment of the Uyghur minority in the Xinjiang region in the north-west of China and the erosion of freedoms in Hong Kong.