Boris Johnson’s China balancing act faces test as G7 comes to town

For Britain’s leaders, the Five Eyes is viewed as sacrosanct – and has grown in importance as the country’s own stature diminished. “The more British power receded on the global stage, the more valuable the Five Eyes was. It was our passport for sitting as equals at the table with the Americans,” said Jonathan Eyal, international director at the Royal United Services Institute, a British security-focused think tank. Eyal describes a decade following the handover of Hong Kong in which the Five Eyes neglected China, as threats of non-state actors such as al-Qaeda and Isis rose post-9/11.