China's ties with Europe gain impetus

Senior diplomats of China and European countries have embarked on a series of engagements and communication this week in an effort to build on the most recent advancement of China-EU ties and shore up free trade and multilateralism.

As part of these engagements, Foreign Minister Wang Yi held separate phone talks on Monday with his Polish and German counterparts. He also met with Denmark's foreign minister in Beijing on Monday.

On Wednesday, Foreign Minister of the Netherlands Caspar Veldkamp will begin a two-day visit to China.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between China and the European Union. Earlier this month, leaders of the two sides exchanged congratulatory messages.

In his phone call with Johann Wadephul, Germany's new foreign minister, Wang expressed the hope that Germany will play a positive role as a major country and a core EU member.

He also said that Beijing expects Brussels to work together with China to properly resolve the EU's anti-subsidy case targeting China's battery electric vehicles.

Wadephul said that Germany is ready to commit itself to resolving differences through dialogue and consultation, and to support the EU-China negotiations to resolve issues such as China's EVs.

In his phone call with Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, Wang said that China expects Poland, which currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU, to "play a more constructive role" and "promote greater progress in China-EU relations".

Sikorski said that Poland will deepen mutually beneficial cooperation in various fields and push forward Poland-China ties and EU-China relations.

Officials and scholars said that China and the EU share broad common interests and a mutual need for cooperation.

"As long as we uphold mutual respect and care for each other's core interests and major concerns, strengthen communication and coordination, and avoid misunderstanding and miscalculation, we can effectively resolve differences and manage and control friction," Lu Shaye, special representative of the Chinese government on European affairs, told China Media Group in an interview this month.

Ding Chun, director of Shanghai-based Fudan University's Centre for European Studies, said that China and the EU have established over 20 high-level dialogue mechanisms. "China and the EU have developed a mature model of enabling the coexistence of competition and cooperation," he added.

During talks with Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen in Beijing, Wang defined China-EU relations as "having shown a stabilizing and improving momentum" since the start of this year, and said Beijing is willing to strengthen dialogue and cooperation with Brussels to jointly promote the healthy development of China-EU ties.

Rasmussen said that Denmark supports free trade, opposes "decoupling", and believes that trade wars do not serve the interests of any party.

Denmark, which will assume the EU presidency in the second half of this year, looks to strengthen communication and coordination with China on multilateral affairs, jointly safeguard the multilateral system and international order, and maintain the momentum of globalization, he added.

During the talks on Monday, the foreign ministers of Germany, Poland and Denmark all reaffirmed their countries' support for the one-China policy.

In addition, the talks touched on the Ukraine crisis. Wang noted that Russia and Ukraine have recently restarted direct talks, and he said that China expects various parties involved to further show their willingness to politically resolve the crisis.

Long Jing, deputy director of the Center for European Studies at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, said the changes in global governance prompted by the US administration will provide a chance for China and the EU to "join hands in advancing international multilateral cooperation".

"The resurgence of the US' narrow nationalism and unilateralist strategies may prompt Europe to recalibrate its stance toward China, adopting a more conciliatory and cooperative approach," she wrote in a recent article.