“Europe cannot stop trade with China, but it must reverse much of the relocation that has already taken place and stop any plans for further relocation,” concluded MEP Hermann Tertsch, speaking at today’s debate in Strasbourg on how the EU should deal with China. Against the backdrop of the country’s belligerent stance in the East and South China Seas, its ongoing friendship with Russia, massive human rights abuses and sanctions against EU Member States, the ECR shadow rapporteur said:
“The People’s Republic of China is a strategic rival and adversary to the interests of Europe and the entire free world, to which Europe belongs, together with the United States. China is penetrating further and further into Africa, Central America and Asia every day, as well as into Europe itself, as we can see, buying up a lot of infrastructure, ports and railway networks”.
According to Tertsch, European policy towards China has been characterised by naivety and a lack of discipline. It is imperative that Europe speaks with one voice and acts in unison, he said, because going it alone weakens the Union as a whole. “However, Europe can not simply stop trade with China, and the consequences of recent shifts put in by Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron and Ursula von der Leyen must be reversed.”
Tertsch pointed out that the European Parliament had already presented a report on a new EU-China strategy in September 2021.
“The European Parliament clearly said that we have to break away from this dependency that has built up over the years.”
President Macron’s trip to China with Commission President von der Leyen in tow had seriously damaged Europe, Tertsch said.
