Here are the diplomatic clashes between the EU and China over Russia, NATO and beyond
What was said at the virtual EU-China summit on 1 April. Marco Orioles's article
The virtual EU-China summit held on 1 April, almost a year and a half after the last time the two leaderships spoke face to face, has already gone down in history like an April fool.
The agenda of the videosummit
Convened by Brussels, the summit theoretically had a rich agenda , which included issues such as climate change, health, biodiversity and of course the eternal problem of finding new balances in mutual trade relations.
But the event was actually monopolized by the war in Ukraine and Europe's concerns about Beijing's possible support for Russia's economy and war efforts as the entire West seeks to create a cordon through sanctions. health around Moscow.
The war in Ukraine and the abyss between the two positions
But, on the aggression of Russia, as indeed on almost all the salient points of the bilateral relationship, China and Europe travel sidereal distances, with the former persisting in refusing to define that war by its name and in discharging the responsibilities on the tensions created by the United States and NATO that would threaten the security of Moscow.
The summit on 1 April did nothing but seal the abyss between the two positions, clearly visible in the words and statements used by its participants, represented respectively by the tern of von der Leyen-Michel-Borrel and by the couple formed by the Chinese premier Li Keqiang, protagonist of the morning session, and by President Xi Jinping who joined in the afternoon.
The words of von der Leyen and Michel
"We have made it very clear to China", the Commission president explained after the summit, "that it should not interfere with our sanctions". Otherwise, according to von der Leyen, it would result in "enormous reputational damage" for Beijing.
For his part, the president of the EU Council, Charles Michel, reported in the subsequent press conference that he had urged China not to turn a blind eye to the violation of international law by Russia. Then reiterating the concept expressed by von der Leyen, Michel also made it clear to his interlocutor Keqiang that "any attempt to evade sanctions against Russia or to lend it help would prolong the war which is not in anyone's long-term interest".
Beijing's uncompromising position
The not at all cryptic words of the European leaders are matched by a perfectly equal and opposite attitude on the Chinese side.
China, Keqiang clarified , is opposed to "taking a stand" and does not at all hope for the "division into blocs" of the world. If the issue is peace in Ukraine, the premier added, China will not refrain from doing its part, but "in its own way".
If the hope of the EU was to corner the People's Republic by persuading it to side with a continent that represents a quarter of China's global trade, compared to just 2.4% of Russia, it has broken against Russia. inflexibility of those who, unlike Europe, see Putin's Russia as a strategic partner.
The considerations of Xi
Playing on the usual thread of linguistic ambiguity, President Xi – on whose position expressed to the European counterparts the extensive report provided to the Xinhua agency is available – first of all formulated a concept already expressed by Beijing in other offices : China "is always on the side of peace "and, moreover," supports the efforts of the EU for a political agreement on the issue of Ukraine ".
But, if it is actually a question of "encouraging peace", the People's Republic will do "its own way", underlined Xi, re-proposing the identical formula of his premier.
This means refusing to endorse the maneuvers of the West which, with its policy of isolating Russia based on increasingly stringent sanctions, would be aggravating the crisis rather than helping to resolve it.
"The international community" – is the Xi thought as relaunched by Xinhua – "should create the conditions and an environment favorable to the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine … rather than adding fuel to the fire and aggravating tensions".
Sanctions? The wrong medicine
Other than sanctions, Xi stressed, defining them as "the wrong medicine" with which, due to the repercussions on the global economy, the world is destabilizing, held "hostage" by the agenda of NATO and the US.
All the fault of NATO
Once again it is emphasized that the real responsible for the war is not those who unleashed it but those who created the conditions for it with reckless moves such as the expansion of NATO to the East.
“The root of the Ukrainian crisis”, Xi continues to speak, “are the tensions in regional security in Europe that have accumulated over the years”. This is why "the fundamental solution is to acknowledge the legitimate security concerns of all parties involved", a code phrase to say that the West must take not one but a hundred steps backwards in its confrontation with Russia.
An April Fool?
The expression is not ours but of the Politico newspaper, which on the eve of the summit noted all the points of disagreement that make the relationship between the two worlds tense at the moment. The war in Ukraine only adds to the long list of issues on which the positions are not only divergent but of open confrontation.
Perhaps, for the first important apical confrontation between the two economic blocs, another date had to be chosen.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/summit-ue-cina-1-aprile/ on Sat, 02 Apr 2022 08:26:33 +0000.