Unlock Editor’s Digest for free
FT editor Roula Khalaf selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
When Xi Jinping last visited Europe in 2019, he launched a charm offensive that lived up to his lofty ambitions. The Chinese president still believed he could bend the West to China’s will and came to Europe’s capitals to demonstrate that Beijing’s rise would result in shared prosperity. He signed trade deals in Paris, celebrated Rome’s participation in the Belt and Road Initiative, and made bold promises of economic cooperation to Athens.
Xi’s European tour this week has unfolded under radically different circumstances. In its five-year absence from the mainland, China’s economic growth has slowed and Beijing has drawn the West’s ire by tacitly supporting Russia in its war in Ukraine. While the Chinese leader could have treated the trip as an opportunity for rapprochement with Europe, he preferred to sow divisions.
Consider your itinerary. Meetings The meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and President Emmanuel Macron in France harkens back to Beijing’s earlier charm offensive, with minor concessions over threats of Chinese tariffs on French cognac. But much of Xi’s trip has been dedicated to embracing Chinese allies who are problematic members of the European family.
The visit to Belgrade on the 25th anniversary of the NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy gave Xi the opportunity to criticize the Atlantic alliance and express support for Serbia’s claim to Kosovo, which does not belong to the EU. And his two day visit to Viktor Orbán’s Hungary has shown China’s deepening ties with the EU’s most disruptive member.
The Chinese president’s ambitions were simpler than in 2019: keep the European market open to Chinese products and prevent the EU from following the path of the United States. Given its ability to export huge quantities of cheap electric vehicles and green technologies, helped by what Brussels calls unfair state subsidies, Beijing fears EU tariffs. After German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s trip to Beijing last month underscored China’s dependence on Germany’s beleaguered economy, Xi appeared to think he could avoid the risk of tariff barriers by exploiting Europe’s failings.
However, their confidence underestimates the extent to which most EU countries now view China as a security threat, exacerbated by its growing ties with Russia, and an economic threat, given its potential to undermine European manufacturing just when the economy recovers from the pandemic. and an increase in energy prices. Recent cases of alleged chinese espionage have not helped Beijing’s image. And reaching out to the warlord leaders of Hungary and Serbia will have done little to calm concerns in key EU capitals about the Chinese leader’s authoritarian worldview.
What is most surprising about Xi’s visit is that he appears to have offered no concessions on the EU’s trade concerns, relating to China’s overcapacity in electric vehicles and green technology, industrial subsidies and market access. He, too, does not appear to have given any guarantees that China will restrict the flow to Russia of dual-use goods, which support his war effort.
However, with domestic demand slowing and the US market essentially closed to Chinese EVs, Europe remains Beijing’s biggest remaining market and a major prize for Xi. The EU is also deploying tools, such as its regulation on foreign subsidies, which allows Brussels to block companies subsidized by foreign governments in public tenders, mergers and acquisitions, which give it real leverage. If it wants to advance its economic and foreign policy objectives with Beijing, Europe will need to project greater unity and determination and, following the Chinese leader’s own example, be willing to adopt tougher tactics.