UK Government Prepares to Announce New Sanctions Against China

The Guardian reported on Monday that Oliver Dowden, the UK Deputy Prime Minister, is expected to announce new sanctions against China due to "cyber attacks" from 2021. The newspaper stated that the UK government claims there were "cyber attacks against Members of Parliament, alongside an attack targeting the Electoral Commission, where it was alleged that Beijing managed to access the personal data of approximately 40 million voters." Luke de Ploegford, executive director of the International Parliamentary Alliance on China (Ipac), pointed out that the UK government "has been far too slow to respond to the cyber attacks launched by China." He expressed surprise that British ministers took so long to react, especially considering that the breach of the Electoral Commission was first discovered in 2022, stating that "with the cyber attack occurring in 2021, and announcing China's connection to it now, indicates that the government has been somewhat reluctant to say that China actually did this."