China

The Prime Minister has called for an international coalition of free countries to oppose the growing influence of China’s authoritarian dictatorship. But it needs to be a lot bolder. The wheels of international diplomacy turn slowly and the government should make full and immediate use of the powers it already has. Three decisive steps are already possible. Companies from Western liberal democracies are bolstering an authoritarian dictatorship First, we should stop entities under the control or influence of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from buying up our companies, especially infrastructure firms. A Chinese company, for example, controls about 25 per cent of North Sea oil and other companies own gas, water and electricity suppliers in the UK.

In 1991, at the height of the first Gulf War, the EU demonstrated to the world its divisions and helplessness, as Belgium infamously blocked the export of munitions to the UK, then at war in the Gulf. They quickly came to regret it. The Belgian Foreign Minister subsequently remarked tellingly: ‘Europe is an economic giant, a political dwarf and a military worm’. It seems these days that little has changed, save that even the EU’s claim to be an ‘economic giant’ is eroding with the loss of the world’s fifth largest economy, a dwindling share of world trade and a catatonic growth rate, even before the pandemic. Worse still, much of its relative economic decline is self-inflicted.

Does the Chinese Communist Party understand how our parliamentary democracy works? The evidence from the last 24 hours suggests not. Along with some of my Conservative colleagues in the House of Commons – Sir Iain Duncan Smith, Tim Loughton, Tom Tugendhat and Neil O’Brien – as well as two peers, a QC and an academic, I have been banned from entering China, had any assets in China frozen (not that I have any there) and have had Chinese citizens and institutions prohibited from doing business with me. All because I have voiced well-evidenced concerns about the persecution of the Uyghur Muslim minority by the Chinese government.

Thoughtful observers of life often comment on the richness of the English language, its huge polyglot vocabulary, its precision, it sinewy expressiveness. It is doubtless politically incorrect to say so, but English has also shown itself to be a conspicuous ally of political liberty. I have commented on this in the past, noting that 'there seems to be some deep connection between the English language and that most uncommon virtue, common sense'. Speakers of English can be plenty extravagant, it may go without saying, but there is something about English — exactly why, I do not know — that acts to tether thought to the empirical world.

The government’s integrated review of foreign and security policy, published yesterday, has landed surprisingly well considering that much of the Whitehall blob has been so dismissive of Boris Johnson’s concept of Global Britain. A few longstanding critics have been snippy about the new document. But no one can disagree that the review offers a genuine strategy. In recent years, one of the most persistent ideas about the UK’s future on the world stage has been that we cannot make a go of things post-Brexit. Such ideas, so the counter-argument goes, are based on the deluded nostalgia of a ‘buccaneering’ nation, foolishly going it alone on trade and much else besides.

Boris Johnson still has a journalist's ear for snappy phrases — levelling up, an oven-ready Brexit, Global Britain. The PM attempted to flesh out one of those headlines on Tuesday with his integrated review — so called because it ties together foreign and defence policy alongside trade and international aid.  The 100-page document — designed to set the course for 'Global Britain' over the next ten years — identifies Russia and China as the UK’s two biggest international challenges. The former is described as an 'active threat', a dangerous rogue state, while the East Asian country is seen instead as a 'systemic challenge'.

World Book Day was last Thursday and now a leading German publisher has belatedly marked the occasion by pulping copies of a children’s picture book. Its crime? Saying something that is almost certainly true: that Covid-19 originated in China. 'A Corona Rainbow for Anna and Moritz' was published to help kids understand the impact that Covid-19 is having on their lives. Based on scientific advice from a medical institute in Hamburg, it featured the fictitious protagonists’ father saying: 'The virus comes from China and has spread out from there across the whole world.' Offensive? Hardly. But it seems not everyone agreed. The Chinese consulate lodged ‘stern representations’ with Carlsen publishing house.