{"id":259829,"date":"2022-10-12T07:19:18","date_gmt":"2022-10-12T07:19:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=259829"},"modified":"2022-10-13T05:57:08","modified_gmt":"2022-10-13T05:57:08","slug":"uk-to-designate-china-a-threat-in-hawkish-foreign-policy-shift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=259829","title":{"rendered":"UK to designate China a \u2018threat\u2019 in hawkish foreign policy shift"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dan Sabbagh \u2013 The Guardian Oct 12, 2022<\/strong><\/h1>\n

China is to be formally designated a \u201cthreat\u201d to Britain in a hasty rewrite of Boris Johnson\u2019s defence and foreign policy that is being brought forward to end confusion among ministers about how to deal with Beijing.<\/p>\n

Under Johnson, China had been categorised as a \u201csystemic competitor\u201d but the new prime minister, Liz Truss<\/a>, wants to take a more hawkish stance quickly, as she seeks to shore up support for her faltering premiership on her backbenches.<\/p>\n

The redesignation will bring the UK\u2019s official position towards China close to its stance on Russia, currently classed as \u201cthe most acute threat\u201d facing the UK. But it is almost certain to provoke a hostile reaction from Beijing.<\/p>\n

It had been intended to complete the policy rewrite at the end of the year, but sources said a special China strategy review was now being brought forward after the Department for Education was forced into a climbdown by No 10 over the weekend after expressing support for China\u2019s Confucius Institutes. One insider said the change could come \u201cwithin days\u201d.<\/p>\n

Influential Conservative backbenchers on Tuesday night welcomed the anticipated move. Iain Duncan Smith, who is campaigning to be chair of the foreign affairs select committee, said a hardening of the UK\u2019s China policy was long overdue.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is time we stopped messing around and recognised that China poses a threat to the way we live our lives, and it is time now to treat them in the same way we treat Russia,\u201d the former party leader said.<\/p>\n

The DfE had issued a statement expressing support for China\u2019s 30 Confucius Institutes, which promote the teaching of Chinese language and culture in the UK \u2013 only for Downing St to demand it made a firmer response.<\/p>\n

The revised statement said the \u201cUK government is committed to doing more to adapt to China\u2019s growing impact\u201d and encouraged anybody with concerns about any of the Confucius Institute\u2019s activities to report them.<\/p>\n

A report by the Henry Jackson Society thinktank had concluded most of the institutes were engaged in activities beyond their formal remit, including political lobbying and expanding China\u2019s reach into advanced manufacturing.<\/p>\n

Truss has adopted a hawkish stance on China for some time \u2013 at one point leading opposition within the cabinet<\/a> to TikTok moving its global headquarters to London \u2013 but her predecessor in Downing St was insistent on a more nuanced approach.<\/p>\n

In a private meeting Johnson once described himself as \u201cfervently Sinophile\u201d, a position out of kilter with many on the Conservative benches, who have been lobbying for a tougher approach for the fast few years.<\/p>\n

Britain\u2019s stance towards China has swung dramatically in less than a decade, from the \u201cgolden era\u201d proclaimed by David Cameron in 2015, the year in which its president, Xi Jinping, was granted a state visit to the UK. Beijing signalled it was keen to invest in strategic industries in Britain, such as nuclear power.<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The battle lines are being redrawn in a realignment of power in the wake of the war in Ukraine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[78,58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-259829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-china","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=259829"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259829\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":259830,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259829\/revisions\/259830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=259829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=259829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=259829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}