EXPERT COMMENT
The UK foreign secretary recognizes the need to talk to China while protecting UK interests, but also shows a desire to provide better clarity on relations.
The UK's national interest is best served by talking to China and avoiding a new Cold War, James Cleverly has said, and he was right to do so.
He made explicit the careful balancing act of recent British policy as reflected in the recent updated Integrated Review - wanting trade ties and recognizing China's growing power but retaining room to reprimand it for breaches of human rights. But his position is also clearer because balance has been reached after years of swinging from one pole to another.
George Osborne, then the UK chancellor, hailed a ‘golden era' of relations with China in a 2015 speech marked by £30 billion of agreed trade deals and a UK state visit by President Xi Jinping. Then followed the exclusion of China telecoms firm Huawei from the UK's 5G network and the UK protest against the crackdown on civil liberties in Hong Kong. And the UK parliament has banned Chinese-owned TikTok from all parliamentary devices on security grounds.
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