Sunak grapples with the China question
Rishi Sunak will describe his “evolutionary” approach to dealing with Russia and China this evening in his first major foreign policy speech since becoming Prime Minister.
During a lavish dinner at London’s Guildhall for the Lord Mayor’s Banquet, Sunak will lay out his vision of Global Britain to business leaders and diplomats.
Top of the agenda will be reinstating his commitment to Ukraine. “Be in no doubt. We will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes,” he is set to say.
The dinner comes days after the PM made his first visit to Kyiv, where he announced a new £50m defence aid package for Ukraine to counter Iran-supplied Russian drones. Although there had been uncertainty over whether Sunak would maintain the UK’s commitment to defence spending, he is expected to confirm tonight that Britain “will maintain or increase our military aid next year.”
While his speech is set to make his stance towards Ukraine clear, it may well leave his line on China a little more open to interpretation.
This “evolutionary” approach to dealing with adversaries means “standing up to our competitors, not with grand rhetoric but with robust pragmatism,” Sunak will say.
It’s not clear what this “robust pragmatism” will mean in practice. Does this hint at a tempering of the UK’s stance toward Beijing?
Sunak has markedly less experience of global affairs than his two predecessors who both served as Foreign Secretary. Perhaps unsurprisingly, his views on foreign policy are generally seen as less pronounced. When it comes to China, his instincts are historically softer than many of those in his party, including Liz Truss. As Chancellor, he championed closer economic ties with Beijing, arguing that the UK should adopt a “mature and balanced relationship with China”.
However, during the summer election campaign, he was keen to push a more hawkish line, condemning China as “the largest threat to Britain and prosperity this century” and pledging to ban Confucius Institutes at British universities.
Does today’s talk of striking a more pragmatic tone with China suggest he is climbing down? It certainly seems that Sunak is mindful of treading a fine line: recognising the need to stand up to China while also accepting that Britain cannot simply cut China off when London and Beijing’s economies are so intertwined.
The difficulty of treading this line could be tested in the coming weeks, however, if the authoritarian crackdown on Covid protests in China intensifies. Indeed, only today, Number 10 was forced to issue a statement condemning the Chinese police for beating up a BBC reporter during a demonstration.
The real tell-tale sign of Sunak’s strategic direction will be revealed before the end of the year when the revised integrated review is published. The big question is whether Sunak will press ahead with Truss’s ambition of officially declaring China a “threat to the UK” rather than a “strategic competitor.” Today’s speech provides a hint that this tougher language may not materialise.
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