Uighurs in Xinjiang

Lord Purvis of Tweed Excerpts

Thursday 16th December 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I agree with the noble Lord that it is important to work with our allies: the US is one, as are other countries. When we did act together—indeed, we acted with 29 other countries with the sanctions we announced in March—that sent the clearest possible signal. Of course, I am very mindful that the United States has further sanctioned additional individuals, and we will continue to look at the situation on sanctions, but I cannot speculate any further.

[Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)]

My Lords, the Government have accepted that the human rights abuses against these people is carried out on an industrial scale, but in response to a question I asked the Minister on 23 March, he confirmed that no preferential access arrangements for Chinese trade to the UK and access to our financial services have been suspended or notified to be suspended. One of those would allow a state entity in Xinjiang to own more than 50% of a UK pension fund, so why have the Government not even signalled their intent to suspend any preferential access to Chinese finance companies to the British market?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, first, I welcome the noble Lord back and we will catch up on his travels. On 8 December, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for International Trade announced, via a WMS, a package of measures to update the UK’s export control regime. This included an enhancement to our military end use control that will allow the Government to better address threats to national security and human rights and completes the review of export controls as they apply also to Xinjiang that was announced to Parliament. The point he makes on financial services is a specific point and I will continue to engage with him on that issue, but we are sending quite specific signals and the announcement made on 8 December is a good example of that.