News of the World

[kyonides]

BBC has invested more than £150million in
Chinese state-owned companies
accused of links to appalling human rights violations

• The BBC has been criticised for investing in Chinese-state owned companies 
  
• China has received condemnation for a string of alleged human rights abuses
  
• Around two million Uighur Muslims are held in detention camps in Xinjiang
  
• The BBC's own Beijing correspondent John Sudworth forced to flee this year 
  
• Despite this, BBC poured an extra £40million in Chinese state-controlled firms in previous financial year
  

At least 10 companies alleged to support Beijing’s totalitarian regime, including two owned by the ruling communist party, have been handed funds from the pension contributions of almost 47,000 current and former BBC staff.
The licence fee-funded corporation has invested at least £155.8million in these firms, however the true figure is likely to be even higher as the BBC pension fund only declares its 20 largest shareholdings.
Documents show that the BBC’s pension fund holds undisclosed interests in six Chinese firms, including one that is part of a company blacklisted by the United States government.
Beijing, aided by dozens of tightly-controlled private firms, is accused of persecuting Uighur Muslims in the Xinjiang region, where two million people are allegedly locked up in horrific ‘re-education camps’ where they allegedly face forced sterilisation, torture, and death.
...
Despite this, the value of the shares in Chinese state-controlled firms held by the BBC’s fund increased by more than £40million in the year to March 31.

Last night former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith described the scale of the investment in Chinese state-owned firms as ‘astonishing’ and called on the Corporation to stop funding firms linked to the repressive regime.