EU foreign policy chief begins visit to China amid tensions over trade and Ukraine war

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has begun a three-day visit to China amid tensions between Beijing and Brussels over trade restrictions and the war in Ukraine. Mr Borrell will meet China’s foreign minister Wang Yi on Friday for talks that are also expected to cover Taiwan, human rights and the violence in Israel and Gaza.

Ahead of his visit, Mr Borrell said he wanted China to take the EU more seriously and not to view it through the prism of Beijing’s relations with Washington.

“My message to my Chinese colleagues will be that the war in Ukraine has transformed us. It helped us move from the position of an economic power to a geopolitical one, taking its strategic responsibilities very seriously, as Russia represents a huge threat for our security,” he said in an interview with the South China Morning Post.

“To be frank, in Europe we are not totally convinced by China’s argument that China is neutral in this conflict. How to remain neutral between an aggressor and the country it has invaded? Being neutral in such a case is just like watching on the sidelines as the fox enters the henhouse and waiting for the outcome.”

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As Mr Borrell arrived in Shanghai on Thursday, a number of European news organisations reported that the European Commission is planning to create a joint tariff zone with the United States to impose steep tariffs on steel and aluminium from countries such as China. Under a leaked commission proposal, to be discussed at an EU-US summit in Washington next week, steel would face a 25 per cent tariff and aluminium 10 per cent.

“The Chinese side believes that the above-mentioned actions of the European Union will disrupt the order of international trade,” China’s commerce ministry spokesperson He Yadong said.

“The EU’s practices push up downstream production costs, affecting the interests of consumers, and are not conducive to the stability of global industrial and supply chains.”

Brussels has threatened to impose high tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles and the commission said on Tuesday it would start risk assessments on four technology areas which could lead to export controls. Officials said advanced semiconductors, artificial intelligence, quantum technologies and biotechnologies were chosen because of their transformative nature and the risk that they could be used for military purposes or in violation of human rights.

The EU and China have reacted differently to the Hamas attacks in Israel last Saturday and Israel’s siege of Gaza that followed them. While the EU has expressed solidarity with Israel and projected the Israeli flag on to the European Commission headquarters, China has called for a ceasefire and identified the occupation as the root cause of the conflict.

“The Palestinian-Israeli conflict keeps repeating for a fundamental reason: the Middle East peace process has been off the right track, the foundation of the two-state solution has been continuously eroded and relevant UN resolutions are not followed through in good faith. China stands ready to continue communication and co-ordination with the Arab League and others to actively bring parties to the table and keep working to bring the peace process in the Middle East back to the right track,” China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said on Thursday.