relations

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer met Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Brazil on 18 November, marking the first meeting between the heads of state of the two countries in six years The meeting, held at the Sheraton Grand Hotel in Rio de Janeiro, lasted approximately 20 minutes. During this brief but significant engagement, Prime Minister Starmer emphasised the importance of a “strong UK-China relationship” for …

Former diplomat and prolific author Kerry Brown, currently Professor of Chinese Studies at Kings College London’s Lau Institute, has just published The Great Reversal (Yale University Press). The book takes as its starting point that while modern China has a narrative of its relationship with Britain, Britons don’t have a similar understanding of our relationship with China. If they are taught any history at all, children at schools in the United Kingdom today are more likely …

A recent report titled: ‘Towards a UK strategy and policies for relations with China’ written by Charles Parton, a former diplomat and senior associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, in collaboration with the Policy Institute at King’s College, London, argues that the UK urgently needs to develop a new China strategy. FOCUS talks to Parton about the report and his thoughts on the future of UK-China relations   …

Recent events have added to a growing sense that Britain urgently needs a better and more substantive understanding of China – now our third-largest goods export market. Torsten Weller examines four recent reports that examine the future of UK-China relations The four publications approach our bilateral ties from different angles and together offer an overview of the choices and trade-offs that will determine the UK’s future approach: ‘Towards a UK …

A new report by Cambridge Econometrics commissioned by CBBC shows that nearly 150,000 jobs depend on links with China The UK’s growing economic ties with China now support well over 100,000 British jobs across sectors from tourism to electronics and engineering, according to a new study by Cambridge Econometrics (CE) released on Tuesday. In its report, CE estimates that a combination of the UK’s burgeoning trade with China, allied to …

Despite the turbulence of recent months marked by Brexit and Covid-19, John Edwards, newly appointed HM Trade Commissioner for China, paints a positive picture of the future of trade relations between China and the UK Overseeing the Department for International Trade’s China arm, John Edwards has been busy in recent weeks managing the logistics of purchasing and transporting large volumes of medical supplies from China to the UK. But as …

Our relationship with China is far more symbiotic than its vociferous critics like to acknowledge Britain is in the grip of some serious soul-searching over its relationship with China. The coronavirus crisis has seen numerous appeals for us to “get real” about our approach towards the world’s second-largest economy. Most of these clarion calls have taken a similar form: a litany of grievances against the Chinese, capped by vague demands …