China attempting to ‘seize control’ of multilateral organisations to ‘weaponise’ them, UK report says
- UK parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee releases new report alleging Chinese actions
- Report focuses on organisations including the WHO and the UN Human Rights Council
China and other nations were attempting to “seize control” of strategically important international organisations so they could be “weaponised”, a new report by the UK parliament’s influential Foreign Affairs Committee said.
The report, published Thursday, accused China in particular of “bullying” states to back their position or their candidates for top jobs, using measures including financial leverage “to shift policies away from the cooperation the organisations were created to promote”.
The report, titled “In the room: the UK’s role in multilateral diplomacy”, called for the UK government to step up its efforts to “combat the influence of those who seek to manipulate and undermine multilateral organisations, including by publicly calling out states abusing and undermining the system”.
“We have seen attempts by countries such as China to seize control of strategically important organisations and fundamentally redefine the once universally agreed principles on which they were based,” the report said.
“This allows multilateral organisations to be weaponised against the founding principles upon which they were built.”
MP Tom Tugendhat, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee and one of the UK’s most influential China hawks, said: “Dictatorships are taking over the institutions built out of the wreckage of the Second World War to defend democracy.