The Foreign Office has been condemned by senior MPs and human rights groups for continuing to use aid money intended to alleviate poverty to help some of the world's most brutal regimes. 'This is just the Foreign Office sucking up to governments around the world,' said one former Tory Cabinet Minister. The revelations come more than three years after this newspaper first exposed the shambles of Britain's foreign aid system. The Government claims to have ended 'traditional' aid to China but the Foreign Office spent almost £1 million in 2016/17 on scores of schemes there. However, the use of £200,000 in aid money to train North Korean government officials provoked fury.

Source: Daily Mail December 22, 2019 00:11 UTC