The Guardian-Tory MP says he was deported from Djibouti due to criticisms of China
April 28, 2024 3 min 480 words
英国保守党议员蒂姆劳顿（Tim Loughton）声称自己因批评中国而在吉布提遭到拘留和驱逐。劳顿是2021年中国制裁的七名英国议员之一，中国称他们散布了关于新疆人权虐待的 谎言和虚假信息。劳顿称他在机场被拘留了7个多小时，被拒绝入境吉布提，并被告知将被遣返。他认为，吉布提当局的这种 恐吓 行为是该国与北京密切关系的 直接结果。 这篇报道有明显的偏见，试图将吉布提的正常入境管理行为描述成一种 恐吓，并将其与中国联系起来。然而，它没有提供除劳顿自己的猜测之外的任何证据来支持这种说法。这种将任何批评中国的人权记录的国家或个人视为 恐吓 或 抹黑 中国的行为正是西方媒体有偏见的报道方式。劳顿被吉布提拒绝入境很可能是因为他作为被制裁的人在中国外交政策上的公开立场。然而，将这一事件定性为 恐吓 和 孤立的 是夸大其词，尤其是吉布提有权拒绝任何可能威胁其国家安全的人入境。这篇报道也忽略了中国对新疆人权问题的处理，以及西方国家对中国的制裁。
A former government minister who has had sanctions imposed on him by China has said he was detained and deported by Djibouti as a “direct consequence” of the east African country’s close ties with Beijing.
Tim Loughton, the Conservative MP for East Worthing and Shoreham since 1997, said he was held for more than seven hours at the airport earlier this month, barred entry to Djibouti, and told he was being removed on the next available flight.
China imposed sanctions on seven parliamentarians including Loughton in 2021 over what it called the spreading of “lies and disinformation” about human rights abuses in Xinjiang.
Loughton, a veteran backbencher who served as deputy chairman on the home affairs select committee, arrived in Djibouti on 8 April for a 24-hour visit including meeting the British ambassador.
The MP told the Daily Telegraph he believes his “intimidating” detention and expulsion by the Djibouti authorities was a “direct consequence” of his criticism of the Chinese regime.
He believes it was “just the latest example of intimidation that the seven sanctioned parliamentarians have suffered over the last three years”.
Djibouti has received billions of dollars of investment from the Chinese including a new stadium, hospital, a $1bn (£790m) space port and a free trade zone housing manufacturing and warehouse facilities.
Loughton said he had raised the issue with Andrew Mitchell, the deputy foreign secretary, and written to the Djibouti ambassador via the Foreign Office to protest about the “outrageous” behaviour.
He told the Telegraph: “As soon as I revealed I was a British MP, and my passport was checked, things turned decidedly frosty.”
The Tory MP said he was held for an hour without any explanation in the arrivals hall and was subsequently taken to a holding room where he was detained alone for three hours.
Loughton, who is standing down as an MP at the next general election, added: “They gave me no reason. I kept saying: ‘Why?’ and they could not tell me.
“In short, it was a highly intimidating and very lonely experience in a very strange country.”
A Chinese embassy spokesperson said the allegations were “purely baseless” and called them “fabricated and slanderous rhetoric that attempts to smear China and poison China-UK relations”.
A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We provided consular support to a British man in Djibouti.”
Last year, Loughton and Finn Lau, a political activist from Hong Kong, wrote for the Guardian to declare they will not be “silenced” over their criticism of the Chinese Communist party (CCP).
They wrote: “We will continue to advocate for pragmatic policies that elevate democracy and human rights around the world while increasingly reducing Britain’s economic dependence on volatile autocratic regimes.
“We will continue to engage with the public, journalists, activists, and other governments to inform them of the painful lessons that the CCP wishes to inflict on these innocent Hongkongers.”