Geo-Strategic Trend - 65. page

Primary Taiwanese news agency Central News Agency (CNA) recently reported that, affected by the diplomatic turmoil between Lithuania and China, Lithuania’s oldest brewery Volfas Engelman lost all Chinese orders last fall. CEO Marius Horbačauskas said that Volfas entered the Taiwan market in mid-2020. In the first year, sales volume was about 8,000 liters. However, in 2021, the volume surged to 180,000 liters, a 23-fold increase. Though not wanting to get involved in politics, Volfas was informed near the end of last summer that the Chinese Internet and the media were criticizing Lithuanian products, and they were boycotted in the Chinese market. In the end, Volfas Beer was notified in October that all orders by the end of the year were cancelled. Marius said that 30 years ago, Lithuania fought and sacrificed to break away from the Soviet Union and restore freedom and independence, so it is easy to sympathize with other nations who have experienced similar experiences. Smaller countries have different needs and behavioral patterns and therefore it is easier for them to understand each other.

Source: CNA, January 17, 2022
https://www.cna.com.tw/news/aipl/202201170363.aspx

On January 13, 2022, the U.K.’s Security Service MI5 (Military Intellligence, Section 5) informed British Members of Parliament (MPs)  that a Chinese lawyer Christine Ching Kui Lee (李贞驹) conducted clandestine political interference work in the United Kingdom. MI5 said Lee works for the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) United Front Department.

Lee is not only a member of the CCP’s Overseas Exchange Association, Chief Legal Advisor to the Chinese Embassy in London, and Legal Advisor to the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of China’s State Council; she is also the secretary of the All-Party China Group in the British Parliament. In 2006, she launched a “British Chinese Political Participation Project”  and received a compliment from Downing Street. Her firm, Christine Lee & Co Solicitors, has offices in London, Birmingham, and Beijing. She is also a frequent presence in the British Parliament. She has been pictured in several media releases with former Prime Minister David Cameron, Theresa May, former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, and Xi Jinping.

Lee’s closest contact among political figures is Barry Gardiner, a Labour Party MP. She raised several hundred thousand pounds for Gardiner, who served as Shadow Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change and Shadow Secretary of State for International Trade from 2016 to 2020.

Lee’s son worked for Gardiner. After MI5 exposed Lee’s status, her son resigned from Gardiner’s office. Lee’s attorney office in London was emptied.

Martin Thorley, a researcher at the University of Exeter wrote in twitter that Xi Jinping promoted China to participate in the U.K.’s Hinkley Point C Nuclear Power project during his visit to the U.K.in 2015. However, the U.K. announced in 2016 that it would defer the project. Gardiner criticized the U.K. government’s decision; his opinion became the Labour Party’s main opinion.

Thorley mentioned on February 7, 2013, that Lee also made donations to Sir Ed Davey, Leader of the Liberal Democrats. The Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats were then in power jointly. At that time, Sir Ed Davey served the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change  His reputation could convince the Liberal Democrats to support the nuclear power project for China.

Epoch Times also found several Chinese media reports on the CCP’s offering high-status treatment to Lee. On March 23, 2009, China News Services reported that Lee attended, as an overseas representative, the Second Session of the 11th Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). Lee said that she was arranged to sit in the front rows and was also invited to join the CCP’s celebration of the 60th anniversary of the People Republic of China.

China Radio International (CRI) Online reported that Xu Yousheng, Deputy Director of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office of the State Council, received Lee in Beijing on April 12, 2011. Xu praised Lee.

In 2013, People’s Daily U.K. Channel opened the “Christine Li Column.”

In December 2017, Lee was hired as a member of the Legal Advisory Panel of the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office. In her speech, Lee said that she was doing political lobbying .

The Times reported that, when Lee attended a banquet at the Chinese Embassy in London in 2020, she lashed out at the British and other Western countries for their condemnation of the CCP’s suppression of Hong Kong people’s rights. Lee told guests that Western media’s reports of bloody clashes between protesters and riot police, including police brutality, “failed to convey the true picture accurately.”

Source:
1. Epoch Times, January 15, 2022
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/22/1/14/n13505251.htm
2. Epoch Times, January 16, 2022
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/22/1/15/n13507104.htm

South Korea’s largest newspaper Chosun recently reported in its Chinese Edition that Seoul National University’s Institute of Asian Studies published the “2021 Korean People’s Asian Awareness Survey Results Analysis Report” in the latest issue of “Asia Briefings.” The Institute commissioned the public opinion survey agency Korea Research to conduct a questionnaire survey on the favorability of 20 major countries including the United States, China, Japan, France, Australia, Germany, Thailand, and Vietnam. The survey results showed that, in  a multiple choice questionnaire, 71.6 percent of the respondents chose the United States as a “trustworthy country.” In contrast, Japan and China were selected by 13.3 percent and 6.8 percent, respectively, ranking 19th and 20th among the 20 countries to become the countries least trusted by Koreans. The United States (69.2 percent) is the top country that “South Korea should cooperate with.” The proportions of those choosing China and North Korea are 6.9 percent and 6.5 percent, respectively. Japan (1.1 percent) is even behind North Korea. On South Koreans’ favorability (on a scale of 1 to 100) toward 20 major countries, the United States ranked first at 65.9, followed by Sweden (59.5) and Germany (58.1). Among Asian countries, Singapore (54.1) ranked highest, followed by Taiwan (51.3) and Mongolia (50.1). China (35.8) was 18th, North Korea (33.8) was 19th, and Japan (33.6) was 20th.

Source: Chosun, January 12, 2022
https://cnnews.chosun.com/client/news/viw.asp?nNewsNumb=20220156539

Global Times recently reported that, on January 10, the Afghan ambassador to China, Javid Kaim, announced his resignation on his personal Twitter. In a handover letter accompanying the tweet, he said he and some other embassy staff had not been paid for the past six months. According to the handover letter, he himself left the Afghan Embassy in China on January 2 this year. In the letter, he gave a brief introduction to the structure and planning of the Embassy. He said that he would use remote means to assist in the handover. According to him, most of the diplomats in China appointed by the former Afghan government left China after the Taliban entered Kabul on August 15 last year. Since “the Embassy has not received salaries from Kabul for the past six months,” Kaim said, they set up a committee to specifically address the funding issue. The letter also stated that he had settled all the salaries of local employees before January 20. Unpaid diplomats also received a sum of money to cover expenses in China. He said that, as of January 1, 2022, about $100,000 remained in the account of the Afghan Embassy in China. Kaim also mentioned that he had left the keys to five embassy cars in his office. All the doors of the Embassy were closed, except for a local operator who could answer questions. The door key was placed at the Qatari Embassy in China. At the end of the letter, Kaim said China was “well informed” about this. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it had taken note of Ambassador Qaim’s remarks.

Source: Global Times, January 11, 2022
https://world.huanqiu.com/article/46MIXNigNVz