The first face-to-face summit in more than four years between China and the European Union (EU) began this Thursday in Beijing with a dog face. If the last videoconference meeting was described as a "dialogue of the deaf" by Josep Borrell, head of European diplomacy, this week the third-largest economy in the bloc has literally burned its bridges. The Prime Minister of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, chose yesterday to announce that she is dissociating herself from the New Silk Roads, the great land and maritime connectivity project sponsored by Xi Jinping.
In any case, the Chinese president has received the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, and the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. Sources close to her had been breaking down the memorial of grievances with which she went to Beijing. His big argument is that the EU's trade deficit with China has reached a record level over the last two years, something "unsustainable."
Xi's great argument is that it is not precisely China that fuels the war in Ukraine or the sanctions against Russia, which have played a decisive role in the increase in the European energy bill - with the threat of relocations to the United States included - then in its manufactured products.
But the EU does not give up and seems determined to ask China to exert greater pressure on Russia and even circulates a list of a dozen Chinese companies that, with their dual-use technology, would be helping Moscow to circumvent the sanctions of Washington and Brussels.
Senior officials in Brussels are expected to criticize China's subsidies to its green industry and, more specifically, its electric car manufacturers, arguing that they drive foreign competition out of the market. But European regulatory muscle will also be on display, capable of keeping selected Chinese exports out of the picture.
Another item on the agenda will be the Israeli military offensive by land, sea and air on the Gaza Strip. Although China, which recognizes both Israel and Palestine and advocates taking real steps towards the formation of a Palestinian state alongside the Zionist state, also has some uncomfortable questions to ask Europe, as well as about its will and ability to exert pressure. on third countries.
Meloni has buried Marco Polo again, as Italy prepares to preside over the G7 in 2024. But the New Silk Road still counts as partners all Eastern European EU members, plus Greece and Portugal. With Chinese participation, the high-speed train between Budapest and Belgrade should be ready in 2025 and should eventually reach Athens. European vertebration with Chinese timbre.
It should be remembered that this long-delayed summit comes a month after the United States hosted Xi Jinping in San Francisco, within the framework of an Asia-Pacific meeting. The meeting with his counterpart Joe Biden, where the differences were also staged, with hot towels, was followed, in a few hours, by a meeting with the cream of the American multinationals. The CEOs, led by those from Silicon Valley, greeted Xi with a standing ovation.
Xi's European impression appears to be more rigid and one-color. Brussels does not even consider such a positive gesture on the part of China, such as the elimination of visa requirements for tourists from Spain, France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands, starting this December, for stays of less than fifteen days. A movement that is part of Xi's conviction - already expressed in San Francisco - that it is necessary to increase human relations between China and the West.
Likewise, Xi has urged European leaders to see China "as a partner and not a rival", avoiding the demonization of their respective political and economic systems. He has also denounced EU restrictions on the export of cutting-edge technologies in critical areas.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, for his part, told EU ambassadors in Beijing on Monday that Europe should opt for "peace and stability" instead of a "new Cold War." In a paradoxical exchange of roles, this and other senior officials of the Chinese Communist Party criticize "the protectionism" of the Western bloc. Not a word, however, about Chinese counterfeiting on an industrial scale of European brand products and designs, for decades, in flagrant violation of patents and intellectual property rights.
The European bloc argues that its trade deficit with China, close to 400 billion euros, reflects the restrictions imposed on EU companies. The reality is that expectations are so low at this summit - cut to just one day for senior leaders - that a joint statement is not even expected.
In any case, Xi and the EU leaders will have discussed formulas to connect the Silk Road with the Global Gateway, the European response - in English and valued at 300 billion euros - to the ambitious Sinocentric global structuring project. So that all roads lead, if not to Rome, to Brussels, rather than to Beijing.
The fact is that, as a result of the pandemic, the EU began to discuss formulas to reduce dependence on China, diversifying, cutting and bringing production and supply chains closer together. Lately with the use of anglicisms such as "de-risking" and "reshoring". But the slap of reality has been tremendous, with a Chinese trade surplus in the last two years of a volume never seen before, increased by the European difficulties derived from the war in Ukraine, to which there is no end in sight.
Despite recriminations and misgivings from Brussels, Beijing encourages Europe to take charge of its own defense, in the interest of the multipolar world traditionally defended by the People's Republic of China and with renewed emphasis since the rise to the top of the party and the state of Xi Jinping. His agenda does not lack commitments - more than one hundred countries have joined the New Silk Roads - and he is already preparing his state visit to Vietnam next week.
