Officials from the Scottish Government met a potential investor from a Chinese company despite receiving warnings it was involved in human rights abuse cases.

Government officials had a teleconference with a representative of the China Railway Group Number 3 (CR3).

The firm is a subsidiary of the larger state-owned Chinese Railway Group (CRG).

In May, Amnesty International delivered a report to the First Minister highlighting "human rights abuses" of a second CRG subsidiary group in DR Congo as well as a report by the Norwegian state which blacklisted the firm due to "gross corruption".

On June 30, government officials spoke with Sir Richard Heygate, a partner of CR3 and a second Chinese firm SinoFortone.

Both firms signed a memorandum of understanding with the Scottish Government on potential investments in March.

The meeting became public knowledge following a written answer by then-finance secretary John Swinney to a question posed by Scottish Liberal Democrats leader Willie Rennie.

Swinney said: "Scottish Government officials participated in a short teleconference with the chair of the Asia Scotland Institute, Roddy Gow, and Sir Richard Heygate of (CR3 partner) SinoFortone on June 30.

"SinoFortone highlighted their conversations with third parties about potential investment opportunities.

"No other issues were discussed and a minute of the teleconference was not taken.

"Officials met with (Mr Gow) on July 29. The memorandum of understanding was discussed along with a range of issues relating to Scotland's relationship with Asia."

Rennie said: ""It is no surprise that the companies involved are still lobbying the Scottish Government but it seems clear that Ministers are moving to cut ties.

"The public information also shows and that ministers only recently bothered to ask the Norwegian oil fund and Amnesty International what they knew about CR3's ties to corruption and human rights abuses.

"This is a staggering level of incompetence. Ministers asked few questions before signing a multibillion-pound agreement.

"It now looks like they scrabbled to cut ties when they were faced with the truth. The SNP need to be up front with Scots, admit they made a big mistake and confirm that the memorandum of understanding is dead in the water."

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said there is no "commitment" over public funds for developments with the firms.

She said: "The memorandum of understanding is about developing a working relationship to explore possible investment in Scotland. There is no deal or agreement and no commitment of public funds.

"The Scottish Government works with many potential investors to bring jobs and economic benefits to Scotland."

The memorandum of understanding between the parties came to public knowledge after reports surfaced online through Chinese media agencies.