Pose with a panda... minister who met Mr Bo
FOREIGN Office minister Jeremy Browne met Bo Xilai in Chongqing days after Neil Heywood’s body was discovered.
Mr Browne also took the opportunity to be photographed with pandas during his official visit to China where he promoted the UK’S trade links with the country.
He visited Chongqing on November 17 last year, three days after the discovery of Mr Heywood’s body in a hotel room in the city and a day before it was cremated without a post- mortem examination.
The Liberal Democrat minister did not raise the question of Mr Heywood’s death, which Chinese authorities were quick to blame on excess alcohol consumption.
Mr Heywood’s friends have said he rarely drank alcohol and questioned the official explanation.
Photographs of the minister playing with pandas will anger British expats in China who have accused the Foreign Office of failing to push for a full investigation into the death because of fears over crucial trade links between the two countries. The British Embassy was informed of the death but sources said ministers were not told and Mr Browne was not briefed before his meeting with Mr Bo, who has since been sacked as Communist Party leader in Chongqing.
The death was not initially being treated as suspicious and was being dealt with at a ‘consular level’, the source told the Daily Mail. In Chongqing Mr Browne praised China as ‘one of our key strategic partners’. Chinese officials described Mr Browne’s meeting with Mr Bo as ‘cordial’.
Mr Browne was the latest British dignitary to visit Chongqing, one of China’s fastest growing cities, in recent years.
David Cameron was there in 2007 and David Miliband in 2008.
Peter Mandelson and Prince Andrew visited last year, before Mr Heywood’s death, and Lord Mandelson is known to have met Mr Bo.