Treatment of Uyghur Women: Xinjiang Detention Camps Debate
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Tom Tugendhat
Main Page: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)Department Debates - View all Tom Tugendhat's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Treatment of Uyghur Women: Xinjiang Detention Camps
Tom Tugendhat Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
Let us head south to the Chair of the Select Committee, Tom Tugendhat.
Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con) [V]
I very much welcome the urgent question from my hon. Friend the Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani). She is raising a central point on the humanity that we share with people around the world, including with citizens of China. I was very keen that the Government should assist companies here, because we heard only yesterday that Manchester University is in partnership with the China Electronics Technology Group Corporation unaware of its connections with the surveillance state that is going on in Xinjiang. Will the Minister commit to helping British institutions, academics or, indeed, companies to make sure that they are not complicit with any genocidal regime or any autocratic state using data or technology that they have provided together to oppress people? Those institutions cannot always know such information themselves, but the Foreign Office can certainly assist them.
Nigel Adams
My hon. Friend, the Chair of the Select Committee, is right to raise this matter, especially around academia. UK universities are open to the world and we warmly welcome overseas students, including, for example, from China, but we will not accept collaborations that compromise our national security. We do work with academia to make sure that any links are closely monitored —whether that is with students or foreign military organisations—and we also work with British companies over the measures that the Foreign Secretary announced in January.