A British diplomat first asked Chinese officials to investigate the death of Neil Heywood on Feb. 15 but it was not until April 10 that the Chinese authorities informed Britain that an investigation was under way, Foreign Secretary William Hague said.
Prime Minister David Cameron raised the Heywood case on Tuesday with visiting senior Chinese official Li Changchun, who assured him that the case was “being examined by the judiciary in full accordance with the rule of law,” a spokeswoman for Cameron said.
Cameron told Li, China’s propaganda chief and a member of China’s most powerful leadership body, the nine-member Politburo Standing Committee, that Britain was ready to offer “any necessary assistance” with the probe.
Li thanked him for his offer, the spokeswoman said, but there was no word of him taking it up.
Cameron’s government has faced criticism from some British politicians for being slow to demand a full investigation into Heywood’s death.
Police in China at first attributed Heywood’s death last November to cardiac arrest due to over-consumption of alcohol.
But authorities said this month that the wife of Bo Xilai, a former high-flying Communist Party chief of China’s southwestern Chongqing city, was a suspect in the murder of Heywood, 41, who was found dead in a hotel room in Chongqing.
The death ended Bo’s hopes of emerging as a central leader and potentially is the most divisive issue the Communist Party has faced since Zhao Ziyang was sacked as Party chief in 1989 for opposing the brutal army crackdown on student-led demonstrations for democracy centerd on Tiananmen Square in Beijing that year.
In a written statement to parliament, Hague said Foreign Office officials first became aware from Jan. 18 of rumors in the British expatriate community in China that there may have been suspicious circumstances surrounding Heywood’s death.
He said he told British officials to make “urgent representations to the Chinese authorities” and to seek an investigation into Heywood’s death as soon as he was told about the case on Feb. 7.
A day earlier, Bo’s once-trusted police chief Wang Lijun fled to a US consulate in an apparent attempt to secure asylum, alleging that Bo’s wife was involved in Heywood’s death.
Top British diplomats asked Chinese officials to launch an investigation for the first time on Feb. 15 and lodged two more requests in the following two weeks, the Foreign Office said.
“In the absence of a formal Chinese response, on March 22, the (Foreign Office’s) consular director raised the case in the same terms with a visiting senior Chinese consular official in London,” Hague said.
It was not until April 10, shortly before their public announcement, that the Chinese authorities informed the British ambassador that an investigation into Heywood’s death had begun, Hague said.
“I welcome the fact that the Chinese authorities have now committed themselves to undertake the investigation into Mr.Heywood’s death that we sought,” Hague said.
“We now wish to see the conclusion of a full investigation that observes due process, is free from political interference, exposes the truth behind this tragic case, and ensures that justice is done,” he added.
The scandal comes at a time when Cameron’s coalition government is trying to build closer trade and investment ties with China to help boost Britain’s stuttering economy.
