Hong Kong
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China’s leader XI Jinping urged the European Union to make the “right strategic choice” and strengthen cooperation with China, but EU leaders called for trade rebalance Tie as both sides tackle the complaints that were sitting deep at Beijing’s tense summit.
Council of Europe President Antonio Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leien met with Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang on Thursday morning and in the afternoon, reported by China’s state broadcaster CCTV.
European leaders have used the conference to express concern over many troubling issues, ranging from the major trade imbalance between the two economies to China’s continued support for Russia in the Ukrainian war, and more recently to Beijing’s chokehold on rare earth supply chains.
Von Der Leyen told Xi that the EU’s economic ties with China have run in a trade deficit of 300 billion euros ($350 billion) last year – reached an “inflection point.”
“As we work together more deeply, so are our imbalances,” she said. “It is essential that we readjust our bilateral relations. It is important that China and Europe acknowledge their own concerns and advance real solutions.”
Meanwhile, Costa urged XI to use Chinese influence to end the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine.
The summit, which was in favour of a planned two-day to one-day event, is ostensibly intended to celebrate 50 years of diplomatic relations between Beijing and the EU.
But instead, facing President Donald Trump’s global tariff war, it’s exposing a growing rift between the two sides, even though they both informed them that they would show hope for a reset of relations just a few months ago.
On Thursday, Xi told Costa and von der Leyen at the People’s Conference that the challenges facing Europe today “doesn’t come from China,” and that the EU “urged them to properly deal with differences and friction.” He called on the block to keep the market open to imports and investments. Exercising “control” when using restricted trade, etc. According to a read from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, economic measures are taken.
“Faced with the accelerated change and turbulent international landscapes that are not seen in the century, China and the EU leaders must… make the right strategic choices to meet people’s expectations and stand the test of history,” XI said.
Without directly mentioning Trump’s trade war, Xi emphasized that both China and the EU are “constructive forces to support multilateralism and defend openness and cooperation.”
“The more serious and complicated the international situation becomes, the more China and the EU need to strengthen communication, strengthen mutual trust and deepen cooperation,” Xi quoted.
But for the EU, a long list of complaints has been in the way of closer bonds.
BLOC raised concerns about “continuous systematic distortion and over-production over-production growth” in Beijing, according to an EU press release.
European leaders have also urged China to take concrete action to address Chinese companies’ access to the Chinese market, ending “unfair and retaliatory” trade measures on EU exports, and raising export controls for rare earths and permanent magnets.
In the veiled threat, EU officials have vowed to take “proportionately and legally compliant actions” to protect the bloc’s interests if the negotiated solution is not reached.
The EU has also repeatedly called on Beijing to not provide significant support He expressed concern over Russian military industrial bases and China’s policies in New Jiang, Tibet and Hong Kong, as well as rising tensions in the Taiwan Strait and the eastern and Chinese Sea.
However, on a rare agreement, the two sides issued a joint climate statement, pledging and pledging to “play leadership together.” An ambitious plan to reduce planetary heat pollution before the COP30 climate conference scheduled for November.
The pledge is in stark contrast to the climate policy of the Trump administration, which retracted the United States from the Paris Agreement and oversaw climate negotiations for career State Department staff.
The EU was not shy about its complaints about its introduction to the summit. Officials in recent weeks have repeatedly been concerned about the European market, which they say what they say is cheap Chinese products, Beijing’s recent move to squeeze the rare earth supply chain, and ongoing support for Russia, which is waging war in Ukraine.
Beijing was hit by these concerns, including the move of the 27-person block last year raising tariffs on electric vehicles, and in clear retaliation, it launched its own trade probe range.
After the EU announced last month that it would ban Chinese companies from taking part in public bids for medical devices beyond certain values, Beijing fought back on its own curb on government purchases of European-made devices.
China’s Commerce Ministry has also denounced the EU’s decision to include two Chinese banks and a few other companies in its latest sanctions against Russia over Ukrainian invasion. He argued that the move would have a major negative impact on the economic and trade relations between China and the EU.
On Tuesday, Minister Wang Wento-Commerce asked for a strict statement over sanctions on video calls with EU trade chief Maros Sefcovic.
Trump’s trade war and his negotiations with both major economies cast a long shadow over the summit.
Earlier this year, there were indications that Beijing wanted to share adversity in the face of tariff threats from the US.
However, in separate speeches to G7 leaders and European lawmakers in recent weeks, Vondel Reyen has made it clear that the Bloc’s deep concerns about Beijing have not been resolved.
“China is using this quasi-monopoly (rare earth) not only as a negotiation chip, but also to undermine competitors in major industries,” she told G7 leaders in Canada in June.
Beijing has extensive control over the supply chain of these important mineral keys, from EV batteries and mobile phones to fighter jets. In a trade spat with the US, it launched global manufacturing after conducting export controls on such minerals in April. China agreed during a ceasefire with the US in June to facilitate management of these.
Von Der Leyen said, “We have called for a unified G7 action to put pressure on Beijing as it is flooding global markets with an overpowered subsidies that it cannot absorb.
Reported by Simone McCarthy of Hong Kong and Olesia Domitrakova and Laura Padison of London.
