Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what (a) representations he received from and (b) discussions he held with the Chinese authorities on that country's white paper on freedom of religious belief.

​We are aware that the Chinese authorities published a white paper on protecting freedom of religious belief on 3 April. A draft version of China's regulations on Religious Affairs has been available since September 2016, and we raised our concerns about these draft guidelines at the UK-China human rights dialogue held in Beijing on 27 June 2017.

We regularly raise our concerns about freedom of religious belief and the full range of human rights concerns with the Chinese Authorities. The Prime Minister raised human rights when she visited China earlier this year.

The UK regularly delivers item IV statements at the UN Human Rights Council referencing China. We also support EU statements, including the statement at the 37^th Session of the UN Human Rights Council 14 March 2018, which called upon China to respect the right of freedom of religion.