UK wants to step up bilateral contacts, British Ambassador to China tells GT on Starmer’s visit
By and Li Meng Published: Jan 28, 2026 10:31 AM
British Ambassador to China Peter Wilson Photo: Courtesy of the UK government
The key focus of British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s visit to China is that the UK wants to step up bilateral contact, a stance that he has made really clear since taking office, the British Ambassador to China Peter Wilson told the Global Times during a press briefing on Tuesday.
For two countries whose economies both play important roles at the UN on the global stage, “not to be talking more is a problem,” the ambassador said, adding that anything that gets in the way of that conversation is bad. Anything steps up that contact and that conversation is good.
The British envoy said this is the biggest thing, as once you accept that you need to keep the channels open, then you can have an honest conversation with each other about what' s on your mind. “We don’t see everything in the world the same way, and that’s precisely why we need to talk.”
At the invitation of Chinese Premier Li Qiang, Starmer will pay an official visit to China from January 28 to 31, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Tuesday.
During the press briefing, the British envoy said the British PM’s visit comes at an important time in the bilateral relations as the two countries have reestablished a lot of high-level exchange structures in various sectors, including economic and trade as well as in science. Over the past year, there has been a lot of high-level exchanges that paved the way for this first prime ministerial visit form the UK to China in eight years.
Wilson said that this visit will cover three main themes, including economic cooperation, security relationship and global issues such as climate change.
During an interview with Bloomberg ahead of the visit, Starmer said that the UK wouldn’t have to choose between the US and China. He also dismissed questions about whether he was seeking stronger ties with China at the expense of UK’s relationship with its closest allies, Bloomberg said.
The prime minister was very clear about that，so we' re not choosing and we' re engaging around the world, Wilson said in response to a question about how to balance between relations with different countries.
The British envoy said there are a lot of things that the UK has in common with China, and a lot of things that it wants to do with China. Both countries are permanent members of the UN Security Council and view the UN as central to the international system, and the UK also wants to cooperate with China more in climate change.
For the expected outcomes of this visit, Wilson said the British side wants to create a stable relationship, and to grow economic and trade relations.
And the two countries are also expected to establish channels to deal with challenges in the world and to talk about the things that the two sides disagree about.
The current British government is trying to reduce volatility in the UK-China relations, and to create stable structures that allow the two sides to talk in much more depth across a whole range of issues, the British ambassador said.
“We want to build the kind of the relationship of mutual respect and trust between our leadership that allows us take this relationship to a new level, to stabilize, to put in place structures and do practical things,” he said.
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