Chinese Prime Minister meets with Chengdu business leaders seeking endangered support for EU-China trade deal


China’s Prime Minister Li Keqiang said 14 people already doing business in China to convince investors that China will continue to be in a good environment to do business as it continues to be open to international trade. I met with a representative of a foreign company in China.

The· Meeting On April 20, representatives of Germany, France, the Netherlands, Hungary, Japan, Singapore, South Korea and other countries failed last month after the EU Parliament failed to approve an investment agreement between the EU and China.

A downward spiral in EU-China relations has created counter-sanctions from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) following the EU’s decision to boycott cotton in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region in March, further jeopardizing the potential for trade agreements. ..

During a meeting at the China Europe Center in Chengdu, which has attracted more than 170 foreign institutions and businesses to invest and settle in Sichuan, Lee went to China’s “modernization” and “world recovery.” The economy following the CCP virus pandemic that praised business leaders for their contributions. ” The centers they meet have attracted more than 170 well-known foreign institutions and businesses to invest and settle in Sichuan.

“China will continue to open its doors to the outside world, and the doors will open more and more widely,” said Lee. He promised that China would “continue to build a market-oriented, legalized and internationalized business environment.”

“Companies in all countries are treated equally and fair competition is guaranteed,” he says. Said..

Prime Minister Lee’s visit, China’s Xi Jinping prime minister has been made a few days after you open the German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French Emmanuel macron president and video conference on April 16.

The video conference was a regular preparatory session prior to the Earth Day World Summit on Climate Issues. During the meeting, Xi urged the European Union to ratify the Comprehensive Investment Agreement (CAI), an investment agreement between the EU and China, which was agreed in December last year after seven years of negotiations, as soon as possible. Ratification by the EU Parliament is required for CAI to be effective.

However, neither Merkel nor Macron have responded to Xi’s request for ratification.

In March, the EU passed sanctions on genocide and several Chinese Communist Party officials involved in human rights abuses against ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. The Chinese administration includes 10 European politicians and scholars, including 5 major EU MPs who need to vote to approve the EU-China investment agreement, and the Human Rights Subcommittee of the EU Parliament 4 Prompt retaliation by imposing sanctions on one organization.

Raphaël Glucksmann, France’s MEP and longtime French human rights defender, said: Voice of America CCP sanctions on the Human Rights Subcommittee represent “sanctions on the democratic system of parliament.”

Beijing also said it is sanctioning the EU’s Political Security Commission, which has 27 EU ambassadors.

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Experts are calling for the suspension of investment agreements between the EU and China. (Getty Images)

Sanctions have offended many EU parliamentarians. The EU Parliament then canceled the meeting to discuss ratification of the CAI because prominent MPs threatened not to ratify the EU-China investment agreement.

Three of the EU’s four major parties said the deal could not be discussed until the Chinese Communist Party’s sanctions were lifted.

Marie Pierre Vedren, France’s leading parliamentarian and point woman in the EU-China agreement, said: Libertarian group updates Europe.

Critics say the deal with China goes to the European market for China-based state-owned enterprises that may receive government subsidies while the Chinese Communist Party administration continues to crack down on Hong Kong’s democratic movement and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. It states that it will give priority access to.

Epoch Times Photo
March 26, 2019, French Emmanuel macron president, China’s Xi Jinping prime minister, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Jean-Claude Yun car the President of the European Commission, and held a press conference at the Elysee presidential palace in Paris. (Thibault Camus / Pool via Reuters)

Merkel and Macron are among the EU’s main supporters of investment agreements with China, despite opposition from other EU member states such as Italy, Belgium, Spain and Poland.

However, Merkel, worried about car dealers’ exposure to China, resigned in September, her SPD plummeted in a recent election poll, and the opposition Greens are in control of the poll. Annalena Baerbock, a candidate for Prime Minister of Greens, has vowed to take a strict stance against human rights abuses in China.

Greens recently opposed CAI in a written statement. “Trade is a powerful way to defend and strengthen human rights and fundamental democratic values. Unfortunately, the EU-China investment agreement, which the German government rushed to sign at the end of last year, contradicts this very goal. doing.”

Macron also faces strong public criticism and strong opposition to CAI in the country ahead of next year’s presidential election.