China and Spain agree to provide 'fair, non-discriminatory' business environment, Wang Yi says

China and Spain have agreed to provide a "fair, just and non-discriminatory" business environment for each other, top Chinese diplomat Wang Yi said, amid growing calls in Europe to de-risk from Beijing.

In a joint press conference with Spanish counterpart Jose Manuel Albares in Cordoba on Sunday, Wang also said China had agreed to lift a 24-year-old ban on imports of beef from Spain, calling it "good news, especially for Spanish farmers".

The ban was imposed on beef products from the European Union in 2000 after several cases of mad cow disease - or bovine spongiform encephalopathy - were found in some EU member states.

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Albares said the impact of the move would be "extraordinarily positive".

"This is a measure which we have long been asking for and which benefits the entire countryside," Albares said, according to Agence France-Presse. "It is hard to find a market like the Chinese market."

Wang, who travelled to the southern Spanish city of Cordoba on Sunday after attending the Munich Security Conference in Germany, said China welcomed "more high-quality products" from Spain.

"China and Spain agreed to expand cooperation in new areas - such as electric vehicles, green energy, the digital economy - and to provide each other's enterprises with a fair, just and non-discriminatory business environment ... to help transform and upgrade our respective economies," Wang said, according to a Chinese readout released on Monday.

He said they would also step up efforts to improve cultural and people-to-people exchanges, and that Beijing had agreed to send a pair of pandas to Spain after five pandas currently in Madrid are returned to China.

According to the Chinese readout, Wang said Beijing was ready to work with Madrid "to coordinate closely ... and propose more effective solutions to promote the political settlement of hotspot issues", without elaborating.

The AFP report quoted Albares as saying they had "agreed to support the solution of the two states: Palestinian and Israeli" to end the conflict in Gaza.

"I have expressed my serious concern about the critical situation in Rafah, the need to achieve an immediate ceasefire, to continue supporting UNRWA more than ever and the indispensable work it does with refugees," Albares said, referring to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees.

Wang, who last visited Spain six years ago, was expected to meet Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez on Monday before heading to France.

It is Beijing's latest diplomatic charm offensive as it seeks to portray itself as a reliable partner to Europe, where there is a push to reduce economic dependence on China.

Wang Yi meets German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Munich on Saturday. Photo: via Reuters alt=Wang Yi meets German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Munich on Saturday. Photo: via Reuters>

In talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Munich on Saturday, Wang called for the two nations to "work together to provide more stability and certainty for the world".

"The two sides should remove interference, continue to adhere to openness and free trade, give full play to the role of economic and trade cooperation as a 'ballast stone', and provide a predictable policy environment for this," he said, according to a Chinese readout released on Sunday.

Scholz, who is reportedly planning to visit China in April, said Berlin was against protectionism and decoupling and that it was willing to provide a "quality business environment to other countries' enterprises in Germany".

"The current international situation is facing a difficult time, and Germany is willing to work with China to play an active role in maintaining peace and stability," Scholz said, according to the Chinese readout.

Wang also held talks on Saturday with his German counterpart Annalena Baerbock, who called for more cooperation "in areas of common interest".

"Germany is willing to work with China to ... carry out consultations on regional affairs, and strengthen cooperation in addressing climate change and smooth international trade routes," Baerbock said.

Wang Yi also met his German counterpart Annalena Baerbock in Munich. Photo: dpa alt=Wang Yi also met his German counterpart Annalena Baerbock in Munich. Photo: dpa>

It comes at a time of strained relations between China and Germany - the world's second and third largest economies, respectively.

The Scholz government in July unveiled its first ever China strategy, which labelled the country as a "systemic rival", echoing the European Union's language that China was "an economic competitor and a systemic rival".

It also urged German companies and investors to de-risk their economic dependence on China, the country's single largest trading partner.

The new policy also raised concerns over what Foreign Minister Baerbock called "unfair competition" from China, and called for a "level playing field" for German and Chinese businesses.

Beijing has rejected calls in the West to reduce dependency on China, with Premier Li Qiang in June saying it was a "forced proposition".

But despite concerns over geopolitical tensions and the Chinese economy - and pressure from Chinese rivals in industries once dominated by Germany like carmaking - German investment in China actually increased last year.

German direct investment in China rose by 4.3 per cent to a record €11.9 billion (US$12.8 billion) in 2023, according to a report by the German Economic Institute based on data from the Bundesbank. It concluded there was "no trend" of diversification away from China.

China was also Germany's most important trading partner in 2023 for the eighth consecutive year, with goods worth €253.1 billion traded between the two countries, according to official German data.

This article originally appeared in the South China Morning Post (SCMP), the most authoritative voice reporting on China and Asia for more than a century. For more SCMP stories, please explore the SCMP app or visit the SCMP's Facebook and Twitter pages. Copyright © 2024 South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

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