Spineless Starmer just made his dumbest decision yet – Trump’s going to tear him to pieces
Labour has approved plans for a Chinese ‘super embassy’ as security fears over the communist state’s ability to spy and interfere grow.
Labour has approved China’s mega-embassy (Image: Getty)
Spineless Sir Keir Starmer has got Chinese New Year off to a flying start. Next month celebrations will herald the Year of the Fire Horse.
Here in Britain it might as well be called Year of the Sitting Duck. Cowardly Sir Keir, hardly in US President Donald Trump’s good books right now, all but excommunicated himself after his craven and timorous government approved plans for a “super embassy” in London.
It means the one-party communist state will have a strategic foothold in Europe. And not only that, within the historic Royal Mint site next door to the city’s financial district.
What could possibly go wrong?
The outcome proves our pygmy of a prime minister lacks any backbone and is happy to appease state-sponsored bullying and intimidation.
Approval comes at a time when the Chinese government is mercilessly cracking down on dissidents, has openly attempted a series of scams to honeytrap MPs and their staff, and has a de facto alliance with Russia.
It is patently obvious to all except this pitiful government that China’s authoritarian regime is hellbent on resisting democracy.
For years it has harassed political opponents and hunted down dissidents but gullible Sir Keir thinks it is for the birds that it would ever interfere in the UK’s sovereign affairs.
Security minister Dan Jarvis said Labour would not tolerate “covert and calculated” attempts to meddle with or in the UK.
But as usual this Government is talking codswallop.
This national security blunder is even more perverse given the UK’s domestic counterintelligence and security agency MI5 issued an unequivocal warning over the risks of Chinese espionage.
But as far as Sir Keir is concerned there is nothing to see here, apparently.
Hands up if you think Labour is weak on security (Image: Getty)
Sir Keir granted approval after Beijing coughed up £255m in 2018 for the 700,000 sq ft base near the Tower of London.
The site is close to fibre optic cables carrying sensitive communications to and from financial powerhouses in the City of London.
And two suites of anonymous unlabelled basement rooms and a tunnel? Their exact use was redacted for security reasons in planning documents… but they would make ideal spaces for eavesdropping or interrogation.
Approval was given despite top-level warnings from the US that Labour would be “gifting the Chinese Communist government with the largest embassy in Europe”.
The base has been described as “counterproductive and unearned reward” but the decision will delight not only Xi Jinping, President of the People’s Republic of China, but his despotic and bloodthirsty brother-in-arms Vladimir Putin.
Plans were blocked by the Tories after British intelligence agencies and Scotland Yard objected on the grounds that sensitive data cables could be vulnerable to attack by Chinese spies.
Make no mistake, this has sparked panic in Washington with former US Army hero, Secretary of State, and CIA chief Mike Pompeo describing the decision as “absolutely nuts”.
He said: “You all are about to let 200 Chinese diplomats come occupy a new embassy. That’s nuts. Absolutely nuts. There won’t be a single diplomat among them. They will all be elements of the Chinese national security apparatus as narrowly understood.
“China presents a greater, deeper threat, for sure. It has both the capability and the intention of undermining the post-World War Two Western model — basic liberty, liberalism, historically grounded liberalism.
“They want to upend it. They’re going to take a good swing at it.”
The Tories say the decision is an “act of cowardice” while the Liberal Democrats believe this to be flip-flopping Sir Keir’s “biggest mistake yet”.
What a barbarous irony that a site so close to the medieval Tower of London could become a modern-day dungeon thanks to Labour.
