Lord Cameron was facing questions tonight over the Government’s ‘indefinite’ pausing of sanctions against Chinese officials and firms implicated in human rights abuses.
Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith revealed internal Cabinet documents had advised ministers of the decision in November – the same month Lord Cameron made his surprise return to Government as Foreign Secretary.
The documents passed to ministers had recommended a softer approach to China despite increasing humanitarian concerns over the treatment of Uyghur Muslims and the crackdown on democracy in Hong Kong.
Just four Chinese officials have been the subject of sanctions – which imposes asset freezes and travel bans – with none handed down in the past three years. The revelation has reignited debate over whether the Foreign Office and Lord Cameron – who oversaw a ‘golden era’ of relations with Beijing during his time in No 10 – are taking strong enough action on China.
Foreign Secretary David Cameron was facing questions tonight over the Government’s ‘indefinite’ pausing of sanctions against Chinese officials and firms
China’s President Xi Jinping and Mr Cameron drink a pint of beer during a visit to The Plough pub in London in October 2015
Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith says during the month of Cameron’s surprise appointment to the Foreign Office, documents were passed to ministers which recommended a softer approach to China despite increasing humanitarian concerns
An Uighur woman protests for freedom in front of policemen in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region in China
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Sir Iain raised the issue in the Commons yesterday, condemning the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) for its ‘terrible decision’. He said: ‘We now know that internal documents show the Foreign Office paused targeted sanctions against Chinese officials in November 2023. And I quote from one of those: ‘FCDO has paused consideration of this work indefinitely’. That is a terrible decision and flies in the face of the evidence.’
Tory MP Alicia Kearns, chairman of the foreign affairs committee, said: ‘To pause consideration of sanctions indefinitely is outrageous. It gives Chinese Communist Party-controlled businesses carte blanche to conduct repression and indeed be complicit in genocide without ever facing sanctions.’
Luke de Pulford, of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, said: ‘If David Cameron’s first act as Foreign Secretary was to pause sanctions against China, he should be hauled before Parliament to explain himself.’
Sir Iain became one of five Tory MPs sanctioned by Beijing after he raised its treatment of Uyghur Muslims in the Commons in 2021.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has repeatedly said the UK will not return to the close relationship pursued by Lord Cameron as PM as ‘the China of today is not the China he dealt with a decade ago’.
A Labour spokesman said: ‘In the same month Sunak appointed the architect of the ‘golden era’ policy to run foreign policy, the Government secretly paused sanctions considerations against Chinese firms and officials for human rights abuses without offering any rationale. It is baffling the FCDO made the decision but failed to communicate it to the many MPs and campaigners calling for sanctions.’
Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell declined to comment.