Chinese and European Union officials have agreed to an economic investment deal agreement despite international outrage over the communist regime’s human rights abuses and President-elect Joe Biden’s desire to coordinate an allied posture toward Beijing.
“This agreement will uphold our interests & promotes our core values,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen insisted Wednesday. “It provides us a lever to eradicate forced labour.”
EU officials adopted that stance despite accumulating evidence that China has enslaved hundreds of thousands of Uighur Muslims, forcing the beleaguered ethnic and religious minority group to pick cotton as part of a campaign of repression that State Department officials have likened to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany. The deal’s announcement came just days after Biden called for democracies around the world to coordinate to manage the threats China’s rise posed.
“As we compete with China and hold China’s government accountable for its abuses on trade, technology, human rights, and other fronts, our position will be much stronger when we build coalitions of like-minded partners and allies to make common cause with us in defense of our shared interests and values,” the president-elect said this week.
Biden’s designated White House national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, tried to give the talks a gentle tap of the brakes earlier this month, responding to a report about the negotiations by proposing “early consultations with our European partners on our common concerns about China’s economic practices.” Yet, Brussels proceeded with the deal, which von der Leyen says will end “forced technology transfers & other distortive practices” that harm European businesses that work in China.
Chinese General Secretary Xi Jinping signaled the diplomatic value that Beijing places on the pact by touting the deal as a victory for “the world’s two leading powers” — an implicit jab at the United States that is emblematic of China’s desire for Washington to lose relevance in EU-China relations.
“2021 is soon arriving,” Xi said. “As the world’s two leading powers, two civilizations, China and Europe should show commitment, act proactively, strengthen dialogues, deepen trust, properly handle differences, join hands to nurture new opportunities, and usher in a new era.”
The deal’s unveiling comes just days after Beijing ratified an extradition treaty with Turkey that activists warn is part of a maneuver to force Uighur refugees in Turkey to return to China’s Xinjiang province.
“The stories coming out of Xinjiang are pure horror. The story in Brussels is we’re ready to sign an investment treaty with China,” former Belgian prime minister Guy Verhofstadt said of the deal, per the South China Morning Post. “Under these circumstances, any Chinese signature on human rights is not worth the paper it is written on.”
European officials announced that China has “agreed to make continued and sustained efforts to ratify the [International Labor Organization] fundamental Conventions on forced labour,” which European negotiators pledged to monitor.
“We have secured binding commitments on the environment, climate change and combatting [sic] forced labour,” EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said. “We will engage closely with China to ensure that all commitments are honored fully.”
