China is targeting critics on British soil - so why is David Lammy rolling out the red carpet?
13 February 2025, 10:19 | Updated: 14 February 2025, 15:36
China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi is due to visit London today to hold talks with his British counterpart Foreign Secretary David Lammy.
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The visit will mark the revival of UK-China strategic dialogue for the first time since 2018 and is being widely billed as a sign that relations between the two countries are ‘normalising’ after a years-long frost.
Talk of normalising relations with China, though, risks a defacto endorsement of the wholly abnormal industrial-scale abuse of human rights Beijing is overseeing across China, Hong Kong and beyond. Rather than rolling out the red carpet, Lammy needs to draw some serious red lines.
Amnesty has issued a list of specifics we want to hear raised over the course of the visit;
We need to hear a public and strong condemnation of the brutal suppression of human rights activists, which is not only limited to mainland China or Hong Kong but has also spread to the UK through the transnational targeting of students and activists who speak out here. It is completely unacceptable to see this sort of international witch hunt on UK soil and the most high-level visit in years must be a time to publicly vocalise UK Government outrage.
The Foreign Secretary also needs to forcefully challenge the Chinese government over its systematic, industrial-scale repression of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet, including subjecting people to forced labour.
Mr Lammy must also specifically demand the immediate release of Hong Kong and Chinese prisoners of conscience, including British national Jimmy Lai, human rights lawyers Chow Hang-tung and Ding Jiaxi, as well as long-held Uighur economist Ilham Tohti.
Trade and security are legitimate areas of discussion. But we must not allow our ability to speak out stridently on human rights to be traded away.
Hong Kong’s recent issuing of ‘Wild West’-style bounties on activists’ heads in the UK indicates the authorities believe they can intimidate and silence their critics overseas with impunity. This is an opportunity to show that the UK will not allow China to buy its silence over human rights concerns.
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Felix Jakins is Head of Campaigns at Amnesty International.
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