Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, whether she has made representations to the Chinese Government on the impact of its Measures for the Administration of Internet Religious Information Services legislation on Christians in that country seeking to access material on the internet.

We remain deeply concerned about restrictions on freedom of religion or belief in China, including the persecution of Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Falun Gong practitioners and others on the grounds of their religion or belief.

We regularly raise our concerns about human rights violations and freedom of religion or belief directly with the Chinese authorities and in multilateral fora. Most recently, we raised our concerns in a statement at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on 21 March. The Foreign Secretary also underlined our concerns in a personal address to the UN Human Rights Council on 1 March.