A vast new Chinese embassy complex in east London is almost certain to be formally approved next week despite renewed worries among Labour MPs about potential security risks and the effect on Hong Kong and Uighur exiles in the capital. The green light for the super-embassy at Royal Mint Court near Tower Bridge would smooth relations before Keir Starmer’s visit to China, which is expected to take place at the end of January, but officials insist there has been no political input in the planning process. It would be a…
Tag: Surveillance
Watchdog cleared ex-Tory minister to work for offshoot of firm linked to China surveillance
A government watchdog advised a former minister that he could work with a subsidiary of a company linked to Chinese surveillance technology, the Guardian can reveal. Richard Fuller, who served as economic secretary to the Treasury in the governments of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, wrote to the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments (Acoba) before joining Investcorp Securities as an advisory board member in 2023. Fuller, 63, is now shadow chief secretary to the Treasury and is due to speak at several events at the Conservative party’s annual conference, which…
Billion-dollar coffins? New technology could make oceans transparent and Aukus submarines vulnerable
Military history is littered with the corpses of apex predators. The Gatling gun, the battleship, the tank. All once possessed unassailable power – then were undermined, in some cases wiped out, by the march of new technology. “Speed and stealth and firepower,” the head of the Australian Submarine Agency, Jonathan Mead, told the Guardian two years ago of Australia’s forthcoming fleet of nuclear submarines. “The apex predator of the oceans.” But for how much longer? In the first quarter of the 21st century, nuclear submarines have proven a formidable force:…
Why are proposals for China’s super-embassy in London so contentious?
Ministers have asked China to explain redacted designs for a “super-embassy” in London as they prepare for a final decision on the controversial building. What’s at stake and why are the proposals so contentious? What is China proposing? If the building goes ahead it would be the biggest embassy in Europe, in the heart of the city and near the Tower of London. The 20,000 sq metre (5 acre) site, which was once home to the Royal Mint, was bought by China for £225m in 2018. Beijing commissioned David Chipperfield,…
China’s cyber-abuse scandal: is the government unwilling to crack down on exploitation of women online?
When Ming* found a hidden camera in her bedroom, she prayed for a reasonable explanation, wondering whether her boyfriend had placed it there to record memories of their “happy life” together. But hope quickly turned to horror. Ming’s boyfriend had been secretly taking sexually exploitative photos of not just Ming and her female friends, but also of other women in other locations, then using AI technology to generate pornographic images of them. After Ming confronted him, he “begged for mercy” but became angry when she refused to forgive him, Ming…
UK academics studying topics sensitive to China face harassment, survey finds
Academics and students of Chinese studies in Britain are being subject to harassment, surveillance and pressure to self-censor as they seek to avoid disruption to funding, a survey of universities by a transparency group has concluded. The findings by UK-China Transparency coincide with new government guidance stating that universities may be breaching rules by having partnerships with foreign governments that require academic staff to pass ideological tests – for example, by hosting Confucius Institutes. Academics working on topics that are politically sensitive to the Chinese Communist party (CCP) reported instances…
TikTok fined €530m by Irish regulator for failing to guarantee China would not access user data
TikTok has been fined €530m (£452m) by an Irish watchdog over a failure to guarantee that European user data sent to China would not be accessed by the Chinese government. Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) regulates TikTok across the European Economic Area (EEA), which includes all 27 EU member states plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. It found the Chinese-owned video-sharing app breached general data protection regulation (GDPR) by not addressing whether EEA user data sent to China would be shielded from that country’s authorities. The DPC said: “TikTok did not…
Threats, fear and surveillance: how China targets students in the UK who criticise regime
The first time Liying* realised she was being watched, she was on her way home from an anti-Beijing protest outside the Chinese embassy in London in 2022. The sky was dark, and Liying – a student in her 20s from China – was walking with a fellow protester, megaphone in hand, when she noticed a stranger lurking behind them. The pair quickened their pace but the man, who looked Chinese, kept following. Ten minutes passed; then 20. Eventually, they ran into a nearby hospital and hid for more than half…
‘If I left, I’d have to go without a word’: how I escaped China’s mass arrests – podcast
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Putin and Xi are the Laurel and Hardy of statesmen – but it’s no laughing matter | Simon Tisdall
It must be tough, being a dictator, when your diktats are ignored, thwarted and scorned. Vladimir Putin is a sad case in point. He ordered the glorious reintegration of Ukraine into his imaginary Russian empire. What he got was an existential crisis that he couldn’t control. China’s president, Xi Jinping, is another paramount leader with dictatorship issues. Xi presumes to exercise supreme control, channelling Mao Zedong like a card-carrying Communist party Zeus – yet repeatedly messes up. Xi’s signature tune could be the chorus to Moby’s Extreme Ways: “Then it…