EU prepares slew of meetings with China
ANDREW WILLIS
27.11.2009 @ 09:28 CET
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – The coming days will offer up a smorgasboard of meetings between EU and Chinese officials, with the main event a EU-China summit on Monday (30 November).
Top of the agenda when leaders from the two sides sit down together in the eastern city of Nanjing will be climate change, leaving the EU just days to digest a Chinese pledge announced on Thursday (26 November) to cut emissions by 40-45 percent "per unit of GDP" on 2020 levels.
The next few days will see a flurry of meetings between the two sides (Photo: Dutch EU Presidency)
The pledge comes hot on the heals of a US announcement on CO2 emissions, as more and more countries show their hand before a crucial UN meeting in Copenhagen next month, designed to secure a global deal to fight climate change.
However Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, whose country currently holds the EU's rotating presidency, and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, are likely to press for more details when they discuss the issue with Chinese premier Wen Jiabao.
They will also stress the need to secure at least a political framework agreement on climate change at Copenhagen that will set out a clear roadmap for a legally binding deal some time in 2010. China has told the West that it is not responsible for the legacy of climate change, adding that it has made considerable efforts to be part of the solution.
The leaders also expected to push a joint "near-zero" emissions energy project on to the next stage. The pilot project, largely funded by the EU, aims to develop a coal-burning plant in China using controversial carbon capture and storage technology, which some environmentalists question as a viable solution to the problem.
The Asian behemoth is also expected to press its case for an easing of property rights and cuts in prices on European green technologies in the interest of tackling climate change.
"I think they have been very clever in asking for that. But I think this will not be in the interest of the European businesses. We have heavily invested in the development of those technologies," Arnaldo Abruzzini, secretary-general of Eurochambres, told EUobserver on Thursday. The organisation represents EU chambers of commerce in Brussels.
Bilateral relations, financial crisis
Discussion will also focus on the current state of EU-China relations and the financial crisis, with ongoing negotiations for a partnership and co-operation agreement between the two sides expected to receive an extra push.
Following a cancelled summit in December 2008 and a fence-mending replacement in May of this year, one senior European Commission official this week said the EU was now "very much back to business with China."
But ongoing tensions over the EU's embargo on selling arms to China and delays in granting it economy market status, together with a spate of recent anti-dumping measures and questions over market access will prevent leaders from getting too chummy.
One area causing particular concern in the EU at the moment is China's policy of maintaining a weak currency, undercutting European exporters.
But how successful the meeting on 28-29 November between Chinese officials and European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet, EU economy commissioner Joaquin Almunia and Eurogroup chairman Jean-Claude Juncker, remains to be seen.
And while the EU has received some clarifications regarding a Buy China clause in the country's 4 trillion yuan (€400 billion) stimulus package, the situation has not improved in recent months, said Mr Abruzzini.
"Everything is becoming more and more difficult in China for European businesses," he said of market access in general, citing a recent list of 130 products that now need to receive "china certification" before they can be sold in the country.
A summit of EU and Chinese business leaders on the 30 November will contribute a political message to the main event.
Human Rights, security
On the 29 November, Swedish foreign minister Carl Bildt will sit down with his Chinese counterpart to discuss foreign policy issues.
The EU is keen that China plays a greater role in improving the human rights situation in Burma and dealing with the security threat posed by North Korea. The US recently adopted a new strategy of greater engagement with the Burmese generals and the country is due to hold elections next year.
The EU and US would also like China to join international pressure on Iran, while the Chinese stress their policy of non-interference in the internal matters of other countries.
"We must be very cautious to conclude that peaceful nuclear technology will be used for military ends," China's ambassador to the EU, Song Zhe, told journalists last week.
Whether these and other issues, such as China's recent use of the death penalty against a number of citizens accused of causing unrest in the autonomous regions of Tibet and Xinjiang, make it on to the summit agenda is uncertain.
