Explainer-in-brief: Love you, love you not: the new China-UK relationship
In a bid to snuggle up to China’s economy, Boris Johnson has tasked the department for international trade to hold the first high-ministerial talks with Beijing since 2018. Rishi Sunak has moved to restart the UK-China Economic and Financial Dialogue, also cancelled in 2019.
The timing of these decisions is a bit baffling, given that only last week the UK was asking to join the EU’s World Trade Organisation case against China’s trade behaviour towards Lithuania. But it also comes as Johnson tries to pivot back to a message about post-Brexit Britain.
China hawks are on the offensive, with David Davis branding the decision “completely at odds” with a coherent policy on China.
The UK has previously condemned Beijing’s behaviour in Hong Kong, in Xinjiang and Tibet, opening up the country as a safe haven for Hongkongers and punishing Huawei. Perhaps this is just another move in the political game of chess between London and Beijing.