UK Parliament bans Chinese delegation from viewing Queen Elizabeth's Lying-in-State at Westminster Hall

The request for access to Westminster Hall is said to have been refused by House of Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle owing to Chinese sanctions against five British members of Parliament and two peers for accusing Beijing of mistreating its Uighur Muslim minority in Xinjiang, ‘Politico’ and the BBC have reported.

China would have a presence at the funeral but not be allowed into the Parliament building, media reports said.

The Westminster Hall forms part of the parliamentary estate, which is under the control of the Commons and the Lords Speakers.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith, the former leader of the Conservative Party, as well as Tory MPs Tom Tugendhat, Neil O’Brien, Tim Loughton and Nusrat Ghani are among those sanctioned and they as well as their families are banned from entering Chinese territory.

In March last year, China sanctioned nine individuals and four organisations in the UK in retaliation after Britain sanctioned Chinese officials for alleged human rights violations in  Xinjiang province.

The sanctioned British MPs had written to the Parliament Speakers earlier this week, seeking assurances that representatives from Beijing would be banned from the parliamentary estate. They had also voiced their objections in a letter to the Foreign Secretary, James Cleverly.

The sanctioned MPs had raised objections about the Chinese President being invited to the funeral at all.

Downing Street has responded that it is a convention that countries having diplomatic relations with the UK should be invited to state funerals.