Rubber, meet road:
Gordon Brown must decide soon whether he will meet the Dalai Lama when he visits Britain in May. If he does so, it will enrage Beijing, even more than the German Chancellor Angela Merkel's recent meeting with the Tibetan leader. All Brown's commercial and business networking during his China trip earlier this year could be undone.
Ah, yes: networking. (pdf).
And working in cooperation with the Chinese government and Chinese business I hope to see by 2010 100 more Chinese inward investment projects coming to Britain, over 100 Chinese companies now listed on the London Stock Exchange, up to 100,000 Chinese students studying in Britain, 100 partnerships between Chinese and British universities and other academic institutions, 100 more scientific collaborations between Chinese and British firms with Britain benefiting from a large share of investment from China's £1 billion Sovereign Wealth Fund.
I think Gordon will duck out on the bald guy, for specific reasons given here, but I’ll repeat myself:
More generally, there is something odd about Britain’s commercial diplomacy in China, which I think may have something to do with the specific nature of the UK’s economic presence. Britain has more Chinese exposure than most EU nations, but the vast majority of this is through investment rather than trade. Obviously, the US and Japan are also massively invested, but their presence is so large that taking action against it would damage China badly. On the other hand, Angela Merkel could have the Dalai Lama’s love child, but if Beijing acted to stop local cadres getting their Mercedes then there really would be a revolution: such are the advantages of exchanging one thing for another. Britain, by contrast, is heavily invested, but not so heavily that China would be particularly affected without the investment. That could be got elsewhere. The result seems to be a kind of reflexive, nervous flattery.
I’m still waiting for David Miliband’s words of support for Tibet’s "civilian surge".
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