{"id":366951,"date":"2025-08-23T10:03:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-23T10:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/366951\/"},"modified":"2025-08-23T10:03:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-23T10:03:15","slug":"uk-delays-chinese-embassy-ruling-after-beijing-withholds-detail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/366951\/","title":{"rendered":"UK delays Chinese embassy ruling after Beijing withholds detail"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Reuters
\n \u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n The British government on Friday extended the deadline until October to decide on whether to approve China\u2019s plans to build the largest embassy in Europe<\/a> in London after Beijing refused to fully explain why the plans contained blacked out areas.\n <\/p>\n

\n China\u2019s plans to build a new embassy on the site of a two-century-old building near the Tower of London have stalled for the past three years because of opposition from local residents, lawmakers, and Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners in Britain.\n <\/p>\n

\n Politicians in Britain and the U.S. have warned the government against allowing China to build the embassy on the site over concerns that it could be used as a base for spying<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n

\n DP9, the planning consultancy working for the Chinese government, said its client felt it would be inappropriate to provide full internal layout plans, saying additional drawings provided an acceptable level of detail, after the government asked why several areas were blacked out in drawings.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe Applicant considers the level of detail shown on the unredacted plans is sufficient to identify the main uses,\u201d DP9 said in a letter to the government.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn these circumstances, we consider it is neither necessary nor appropriate to provide additional more detailed internal layout plans or details.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The British government\u2019s department of housing said in reply it would now rule on whether the project can go ahead by October 21 rather than by September 9 because it needed more time to consider the responses.\n <\/p>\n

\"Protesters<\/p>\n

\n Luke de Pulford, executive director of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, a group with ties to an international network of politicians critical of China which revealed the letter, said: \u201cThese explanations are far from satisfactory.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n De Pulford, a long-standing critic of plans for the embassy, said the \u201cassurances amount to \u2018trust me bro\u2019\u201d.\n <\/p>\n

\n The Chinese embassy in London expressed \u201cserious concern\u201d over the government\u2019s response.\n <\/p>\n

\n The embassy said host countries have an \u201cinternational obligation\u201d to support the construction of diplomatic buildings.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe Chinese side\u2002urges\u2002the UK side to fulfil its obligation\u2002and approve the planning application without delay,\u201d the embassy said in a statement.\n <\/p>\n

\n Earlier this month, the embassy said claims that the building could have \u201csecret facilities\u201d used to harm Britain\u2019s national security were \u201cdespicable slandering\u201d.\n <\/p>\n

\n The Chinese government purchased Royal Mint Court in 2018 but its requests for planning permission to build the new embassy there were rejected by the local council<\/a> in 2022. Chinese President Xi Jinping asked Prime Minister Keir Starmer last year to intervene.\n <\/p>\n

\n Starmer\u2019s central government took control of the planning decision last year.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Facebook Tweet Email Link Reuters \u00a0\u2014\u00a0 The British government on Friday extended the deadline until October to decide…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":366952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[748,393,4884,1144,712,16,15,1764],"class_list":{"0":"post-366951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-uk","8":"category-united-kingdom","9":"tag-britain","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-northern-ireland","13":"tag-scotland","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-wales"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115077513534401277","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=366951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/366951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/366952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=366951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=366951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=366951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}