Several of the news items and analyses from this week focus on the relevance of French President Macron’s visit to China. In particular, one Reuters article [China's new 'Silk Road' cannot be one-way, France's Macron says] highlights Mr Macron’s keenness on stressing how China’s Belt and Road Initiative cannot be interpreted by either European or Chinese actors as Beijing’s unidirectional push for Eurasian hegemony. As also mentioned in the New York Times feature [In China, Macron Presses EU for United Front on Foreign Takeovers], as China uses the BRI to expand its burgeoning FDI portfolio, the risk of internal divisions within the EU rises, especially considering the appeal that Chinese money has on financially weaker EU Member States. In this sense, Greece constitutes a prime example, considering COSCO’s 2016 takeover of the port of Piraeus and the just-launched Chinese-led upgrade of the port itself [China Cosco Shipping launches new projects in Greece at start of 2018]. Hence, it is imperative that the EU show a united front vis-à-vis the initiative, as this is what will prevent it from being considered by China an unreliable and therefore less relevant, ‘junior’ partner.
Macron’s words are all the more relevant when we look at the almost daily headlines made by Beijing’s BRI-inspired growing global engagement. Only this week, one article discusses the recent steps forward in Sino-Israeli economic relations, which have been flourishing especially following the rather withdrawn approach to the Middle East of the new US administration [China Is Making Inroads in Israel as Trump Alienates Allies]; another article highlights China’s burgeoning infrastructure investment in far-flung Brazil [China Extends BRI Investment to Brazilian Infrastructure Programme], which once again underlines the truly global reach of Xi Jinping’s new diplomacy. Thus, from a European standpoint, coherence and consistency are crucial in order to maintain a sufficient degree of oversight on how BRI-related projects play out on EU territory.
Francesco S. Montesano
This week's Silk Road Headlines
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