On the eve of his first state visit to the UK, the Chinese president speaks in glowing terms about the prospect of closer ties between London and Beijing

Britain has made 'visionary' choice to become China's best friend, says Xi

Chinese president Xi Jinping praised Britain’s “visionary and strategic choice” to become Beijing’s best friend in the west as he prepared to jet off on his first state visit to the UK, taking with him billions of pounds of planned investment.

The trip, Xi’s first to Britain in more than two decades, has been hailed by British and Chinese officials as the start of a “golden era” of relations which the Treasury hopes will make China Britain’s second biggest trade partner within 10 years.



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“The UK has stated that it will be the western country that is most open to China,” Xi told Reuters in a rare written interview published on the eve of his departure.

“This is a visionary and strategic choice that fully meets Britain’s own long-term interest.”

During the four-day trip, which officially begins on Tuesday, Xi will be feted by sports and film stars, Nobel-winning scientists, members of the royal family and politicians. David Cameron and George Osborne will both accompany Xi, who Beijing describes as a football fan, to Manchester where he will visit Manchester City football club and dine at Town Hall.

The Communist party leader will also address parliament.

Chinese state media has predicted Britain will afford an “ultra-royal welcome” to Xi, who last set foot in the UK in 1994 when he was an official in the south-eastern city of Fuzhou.

A frontpage story in the China Daily boasted that Xi’s arrival would be celebrated with a 103-gun salute – 41 in Green Park and 62 at the Tower of London.

Fraser Howie, the co-author of Red Capitalism, said Beijing would revel in the pomp and circumstance.

“They will be looking for horses and people in funny hats and meeting the Queen. That plays fantastically well back in China and they make big use of that to show how important the Chinese leadership is,” he said.

“It also plays to the pitch that China is now being recognised on the world stage as a great power. This is especially true in Britain’s case because it was those nasty Brits who beat them in the opium war. Now the table has turned and it is China in the ascendancy and it is Britain who is pandering to the Chinese.”

Michel Hockx, the director of the SOAS China Institute, said Xi was coming to Britain with clear economic objectives.

“The Chinese economy is slowing down and it is changing its nature from an investment-driven growth economy to an economy that has to look to invest in other places,” he said. “Chinese businesses are very eager to invest in other countries and some of the best export products that China has to offer are to do with infrastructure, high-speed trains, energy things like that and these are exactly the things that the UK needs.”



About 150 deals are expected to be sealed this week in areas such as healthcare, aircraft manufacturing and energy. Perhaps the most significant anticipated announcement surrounds moves to allow China to design and build a new nuclear power plant at Bradwell in Essex.

Beijing hopes that project will serve as an international shop window that will help it hawk its nuclear technology around the globe.

As well as securing billions of pounds of Chinese investment, Britain hopes to advance efforts to turn London into a key trading centre for China’s currency, the renminbi, and to boost trade with the world’s second largest economy.



During a tour of China last month, chancellor George Osborne unveiled plans to make it Britain’s second biggest trade partner by 2025.



The growing proximity between the Conservative and Communist parties has attracted fierce criticism from those who believe Britain has abandoned its commitment to human rights by cosying up to Beijing.

British officials say that while there will be “robust” behind-the-scenes discussions there will be no room for “megaphone diplomacy” during Xi’s visit. China’s UK ambassador Liu Xiaoming last week warned that his president would be offended if he faced public criticism over human rights.



Howie accused Downing Street of turning its back on Hong Kong’s struggle for democracy and ignoring an unprecedented crackdown on dissent that is underway back in China.

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“It is so obsequious, it is just nauseating,” said Howie. “Clearly, China under Xi Jinping has become highly repressive towards those who do not agree with the rules ... [but] we haven’t heard anything of substance from the UK government about what is happening.

“[Beijing] must be loving how America’s best ally is fawning and falling over itself to curry favour with China.”

Britain’s determination to build a “golden era” of relations with China – and its increasing public silence on issues such as human rights – marks a striking U-turn for David Cameron.

During a 2010 trip to Beijing he called for “greater political opening” in China and talked of concerns over human rights.



“We don’t raise these issues to make to us look good, or to flaunt publicly that we have done so. We raise them because the British people expect us to, and because we have sincere and deeply held concerns,” Cameron said.

Hockx, from SOAS, said Britain appeared to be taking advantage of the growing rift between China and the United States, whose relationship has suffered because of issues including cyber-espionage and the South China Sea.

“In a sense Cameron is doing to Xi Jinping what Tony Blair did to George Bush. [There were] massive ideological differences at the time between Europe and America but Britain was the one country that stuck with the US. And in a sense Cameron is doing the same with China now, saying, ‘We are going to stick with you in this partnership despite the fact that other European countries and other western countries have these problems with you.’



“It’s a risky policy but it is certainly one that in terms of trade relations could be very beneficial,” Hockx added.



In an editorial, the state-run Global Times tabloid praised Downing Street’s policy change and dismissed criticism of the “golden era” as “sour grapes”.



“The national interests of Britain are the foundation of this policy,” it argued. “David Cameron or [George] Osborne will not blink in front of the ‘human rights fighters.’”

In his written interview with Reuters, Xi recognised there were “misgivings” about the relationship between Beijing and London.



“What I want to stress is that in today’s world, no country can afford to pursue development with its door closed. One should open the door, warmly welcome friends and be hospitable to them,” he wrote.



Kerry Brown, the director of King’s College London’s Lau China Institute, said Beijing would be unperturbed by the prime minister’s change of heart and glad to deal with an increasingly “compliant” Britain.



“The Chinese have dealt with the British for a long time, since Macartney’s mission to China in 1793. So they are practiced at the brilliant complexity of British hypocrisy and I think they are very comfortable dealing with that. This works well for them.”