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European Union leaders have warned against being\u00a0drawn into a confrontation with China\u00a0and a breakdown in ties but said they would stand up for their principles and independence in relations with Beijing.<\/p>\n
During a summit in Brussels on Friday, the 27-nation bloc held three hours of strategic talks on its approach to China as President Xi Jinping tightens his grip over an ever more assertive Beijing.<\/p>\n
Torn between the desire to access China\u2019s vast markets and condemnation of its rights abuses in the\u00a0Xinjiang region, as well as\u00a0aggressive policies in Hong Kong\u00a0and\u00a0towards Taiwan, the EU has struggled to fashion a cohesive stance towards Beijing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis discussion showed a very clear will to avoid being naive, but neither did we want to embark into a logic of systematic confrontation [with China],\u201d summit host and EU Council President Charles Michel said on Friday.<\/p>\n
Michel insisted the bloc has its \u201cown model to develop\u201d at a time of intensifying rivalry between China and the United States.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will always be firm in standing up to defend our principles, democracy, fundamental freedoms,\u201d Michel said.<\/p>\n
Since 2019, the EU has officially regarded China as a partner, an economic competitor as well as a systemic rival.<\/p>\n
An EU foreign policy paper prepared for the summit stated that Beijing should now be thought of primarily as a competitor which is promoting \u201can alternative vision of the world order\u201d.<\/p>\n
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Beijing was \u201ccontinuing its mission to establish its dominance in East Asia and its influence globally\u201d. She also warned about the\u00a0close ties between China and Russia, despite the international condemnation of Moscow\u2019s invasion of Ukraine.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese developments will affect the EU-China relationship,\u201d von der Leyen said.<\/p>\n
The EU is also keen to ensure it does not fall into a trap \u2014 as it did with Russia \u2014 of becoming dependent on China for critical raw materials and technologies.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, we have to be very vigilant when it comes to dependencies. And we\u2019ve learned our lesson,\u201d von der Leyen said.<\/p>\n
Responding to the comments by EU leaders, a spokesperson for China\u2019s Mission to the EU said late on Friday that the \u201cdeeply ideology-orientated remarks\u201d reflected the views of some people who \u201ccling on to bloc politics mindset, priding their own values as the absolute truth and wantonly imposing their ideology on others\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cChina\u2026equally opposes and urges all to stay alert to the rising clamour for ideological confrontation, which might lead to clashes or even confrontations among civilisations,\u201d the spokesperson said in a statement.<\/p>\n
China is committed to peace, friendship and cooperation with other countries, and believes that \u201cChina and the EU are partners rather than rivals, and that China-EU cooperation far outweighs our competition\u201d, the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
European Union leaders have warned against being\u00a0drawn into a confrontation with China\u00a0and a breakdown in ties but said they would stand up for their principles and independence in relations with Beijing. During a summit in Brussels on Friday, the 27-nation bloc held three hours of strategic talks on its approach to China as President Xi […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":183082,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10221280388112155_325455220908133":"","twitter_917774835383787521_917774835383787521":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183081"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183081"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":183083,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183081\/revisions\/183083"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/183082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wardoon.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}