Liu Xiaoming – No Muslim concentration camps in Xinjiang
Today’s Sunday interviews took a heavier focus on foreign affairs than usual, with Andrew Marr counting not one, but two ambassadors among his guests. He began by speaking to Liu Xiaoming, the Chinese ambassador, and confronted him with aerial footage appearing to show restrained Uighur Muslims preparing to be transported to ‘re-education’ camps, alongside testimony that Uighur women were being forced to undergo sterilisation procedures. Liu denied that such human rights abuses were Chinese government policy and tried to brand the claims as fake:
LX: The government policy is strongly opposed to this kind of practice, but I cannot rule out single cases… There are no such concentration camps in Xinjiang.
‘So-called’ Western intelligence is making ‘false accusations’
Marr asked Liu to explain the drone footage, which has been vouched for by experts at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. Again, Liu sought to deny the veracity of the footage, and insisted that the Uighur population of the province was still growing:
AM: What is going on there?
LX: I don’t know where you got this video tape… The so-called Western intelligence make these false accusations against China [that] 1 million Uighurs have been persecuted… Xinjiang has 11 million [Uighurs]… The population has doubled in 40 years.
Freedom in Hong Kong ‘fully respected’
Marr also asked about the imposition of a national security law over Hong Kong, which threatens crackdowns on protestors and to undermine the ‘one country, two systems’ policy that has been in place since the handover in 1997. The ambassador sought to downplay the risks of the new law to Hong Kongers, and insisted that dissidents would be free to leave the region if they chose:
AM: Are rights of dissent and freedom of speech still valued in Hong Kong?
Liu denied that such human rights abuses were Chinese government policy and tried to brand the claims as fake
LX: Fully respected… The reason why this national law was enacted is… because of these trouble makers [and] scaremongering, the [Hong Kong] government has failed to implement… national security.
Huawei decision ‘a darker day’ for the UK
Last week the UK government made the decision to remove equipment installed by the Chinese tech company Huawei from its 5G infrastructure by 2027, marking a significant volte-face. Ambassador Liu made clear his unhappiness with the decision:
LX: This is a very bad decision… This is a dark day for Huawei, this is a dark day for China-UK relations. It is an even darker day for the United Kingdom, because you missed the opportunity to be a leading country.
Andrei Kelin – Russia did not interfere in the 2019 election
Marr also hosted a pre-recorded interview with the new Russian ambassador to the UK Andrei Kelin. With the government set to publish its long awaited ‘Russia report’ this week, Marr asked Kelin if there was any truth to the concerns that Russia tried to influence the result of the 2019 general election:
AK: We do not interfere at all. We do not see any point of interference because for us, whether it will be the Conservative party or Labour party at the head of this country, we will try to set up and to establish better relations than now.
Cozy Bear hack ‘impossible’ to attribute to Russia
Marr also inquired about a computer hacking by a group known as the ‘Cozy Bears’, which allegedly attempted to steal data from organisations working on a Covid-19 vaccine in various locations across the UK, USA and Canada. UK security agencies believe that the ‘Cozy Bears’ have direct links to the Russian intelligence services. Kelin claimed to have no knowledge of the group:
AK: In this world, to attribute any kind of computer hackers to any country, is impossible.
Salisbury Poisonings drama ‘so dull’
Marr asked Kelin if he had been watching the BBC’s recent dramatisation of the Salisbury incident, where the novichok nerve agent was used in 2018 to target former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal, later leading to the death of Dawn Sturgess. Kelin’s review was less than enthusiastic:
AK: I saw part of them. They are so dull I am afraid that I couldn’t stand until the end of the first [programme]… We still do not know what has happened in reality… We know that something happened, then the British government felt insulted… We are prepared to turn the page.
Dominic Raab – There are ‘gross, egregious human rights abuses’ in China
Marr also spoke to the Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab and sought his verdict on what was taking place in Xinjiang province. Raab declined to use the term ‘genocide’, but criticised the Chinese government’s human rights record and said that the issue had been raised at the United Nations:
DR: Whatever the label, it is clear that there are gross, egregious human rights abuses going on… We are working with our international partners on this, and it is deeply, deeply troubling.
Russian government behaviour ‘outrageous and reprehensible’
Raab also spoke to Sophy Ridge and told her that he was entirely convinced that the Russian government was indeed behind the ‘Cozy Bear’ cyber-attack and said that the UK was committed to holding Russia to account:
DR: We’re absolutely confident that the Russian intelligence agencies were engaged in a cyber-attack… with a view either to sabotage or profit from the research and development that was taking place… I think it’s outrageous and reprehensible that the Russian government is engaged in this activity.
We call on Anne Sacoolas to face justice in UK
Earlier in her show, Ridge had interviewed Charlotte Charles, the mother of Harry Dunn, the 19-year-old who was killed in a collision with Anne Sacoolas, the wife of a US diplomat. Sacoolas, who had been driving on the wrong side of the road, fled to the US and claimed diplomatic immunity from prosecution. Almost a year on from Dunn’s death, Raab promised to keep raising the issue with his US counterpart Mike Pompeo, and called on Sacoolas to do the right thing:
DR: There is an extradition request that is outstanding… I raised it with Mike Pompeo this week. Of course we will discuss it when[ever] we see them… [Sacoolas] could of course, of her own volition… come home. We call on her to make that decision as well.
Government will appeal Shamima Begum ruling
As Home Secretary, Sajid Javid revoked the citizenship of Shamima Begum, who left the UK as a teenager in 2015 to join the Islamic State. The Court of Appeal has ruled that Begum should be allowed to return to the UK in order to challenge Javid’s decision. Marr asked Raab what would happen next:
DR: We will be seeking to appeal [this decision]. We do not want [Begum] to return to the UK. We think there is a threat.
Lisa Nandy – UK could freeze assets in China
Ridge interviewed the shadow foreign secretary Lisa Nandy. Nandy put forward a suggestion for the UK government to take in order to tackle human rights abuses in China:
LN: One very concrete thing that the government could do… is to freeze the assets of any of the Chinese officials involved in those human rights abuses… We’ve got new legislation now… The UK should not be a haven for people who abuse human rights overseas.
Labour ‘got it wrong on Russia’
And finally, Ridge asked Nandy if she felt that Labour had been ‘naive’ in its approach to dealing with Russia:
LN: I think we got it wrong on Russia, and… when the Salisbury attacks happened, we prevaricated… we called for dialogue at a moment when chemical weapons had been used on the streets of the UK.. We let them off the hook, and we let the Conservatives off the hook… I strongly believe that has to change.
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