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By STUART LAU
with PHELIM KINE
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WELCOME TO CHINA WATCHER. This is Stuart Lau reporting from Brussels this Tuesday morning. Phelim Kine will be with you in Washington on Thursday.
BREAKING NEWS
ANOTHER ROCKET MAN FIRED: The official probe into the Rocket Force of the People’s Liberation Army has widened, with Tuesday’s sacking of Wang Xiaojun, a research chief, from the Communist Party’s top political advisory body. Bloomberg has the details.
EVERGRANDE COLLAPSE: A Hong Kong court on Monday ordered Evergrande, the world’s most indebted real estate developer, to liquidate. “Enough is enough,” the judge, Linda Chan, told Evergrande’s lawyers, as the troubled developer couldn’t come up with a plan to restructure its debts. The BBC has more.
EU HOSTS INDO-PACIFIC FORUM
ALL AT ONCE IN BRUSSELS: EU foreign ministers will be in Brussels for the third annual Indo-Pacific ministerial forum on Friday, plus a smaller gathering exclusively with Southeast Asian counterparts (minus Myanmar) in the ASEAN bloc. There’ll also be a Pacific Day event on Thursday, though much of the focus then will instead go to the European Council’s special summit, in which the EU’s leaders will both be discussing the EU’s future top jobs and piling pressure on Hungary to sign off on a financial aid package for war-torn Ukraine. It’s a messy world.
Not invited: For the third time in a row, China isn’t on the list of attendees for the EU’s Indo-Pacific ministerial forum, which is now as old as Russia’s war against Ukraine. It was inaugurated in Paris in 2022 just shortly before Russian troops invaded, and was held in Sweden last year.
To be confirmed: As of Monday, the EU couldn’t confirm the exact list of participants. China Watcher heard that a couple of prominent Indo-Pacific countries probably wouldn’t be sending their foreign ministers to the meeting, due to domestic scheduling.
On the menu: The EU is expected to discuss with Indo-Pacific countries further security cooperation, economic and trade relations, connectivity (read: anti-Belt and Road stuff), the green transition and climate change. Indo-Pacific countries expect the EU to come up with “real” policy details, and not just empty rhetoric.
Hidden appetite: Security issues with China are core concerns for quite a few participants. Japan and South Korea are especially worried about Beijing’s potential escalation in the Taiwan Strait before the inauguration of a new China-skeptic president in mid-May. The Philippines has also been in conflicts with Chinese coastguard boats in disputed shoals.
Defense deal 1: India, whose years-long unease with China has shown no sign of deescalation, concluded a road map with France for future potential defense industrial cooperation, namely in space, aeronautics, submarine technologies, AI and robotics. The deal was signed during President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to New Delhi to celebrate Republic Day, Laura Kayali reports. (Caveat: While India is pivoting away from Russia when it comes to defense, the ties between the two countries remain solid, according to Reuters.)
Defense deal 2: Japan and Germany on Monday concluded a military pact to facilitate exchanges of supplies and logistical support as the two countries aim to strengthen their defense ties in the face of China’s growing maritime assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region. The deal was signed between Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa and German Ambassador to Japan Clemens von Goetze on Monday in Tokyo. The Japan Times has more.
To watch today: Belgium’s Prime Minister Alexander De Croo will speak at 4:30pm CET on Indo-Pacific diplomacy at an event organized by the Centre for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy.
Central Asia in the spotlight, too: The Global Gateway Investors Forum for EU-Central Asia Transport Connectivity opened yesterday in Brussels. EU Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis announced that European and international financial institutions will commit €10 billion in support and investments toward sustainable transport connectivity in Central Asia.
CHINA’S NO FAN OF EU: Meanwhile, Beijing hit out at the European Commission’s package on economic security, announced last week. “In recent years, the international community has expressed quite a bit of worries and concerns about the European Union’s protectionist and unilateralist moves in the aspect of economics and trade,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said. “This affects not only the EU’s image in international economics and trade, but also concerns Chinese and other companies’ confidence in doing business in Europe.”
NATO-CHINA
FIRST MEETING IN 5 YEARS: NATO's Assistant Secretary General Boris Ruge visited China last week to chair the first annual consultation conducted in person since 2019.
Transparency’s the key word: NATO and Chinese officials discussed "respective security concerns with a view to building reciprocal transparency," a NATO official told China Watcher, stressing that the last few meetings were done virtually.
In the past, NATO’s chief had demanded more Chinese transparency on nuclear development.
All good, all good: On Ruge’s visit, the NATO official added: "China is not our adversary, and we will continue to engage with China when it is in the Alliance's security interest to do so."
Or … is it? Beijing's kept a low key on the meeting, with no official announcement on the Foreign Ministry’s website. However, a defense ministry spokesperson went on the offensive when asked about NATO last week.
"It’s fair to say NATO is like a walking war machine, wherever it goes, there will be instability," spokesman Wu Qian said, commenting on NATO's biggest-in-history Steadfast Defender exercise.
Don’t wanna see you here: "In recent years, NATO has been inching closer to the Asia Pacific and using the non-existent ‘China threat’ as an excuse to advance bloc confrontation, which poses a threat to regional security,” Wu said.
FRANCE GETS THE SPOTLIGHT
TURNING SIXTY: China and France celebrated the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations this week. So what are the Chinese state media focusing on?
Have your dose: In an interview with Chinese state media Xinhua marking the anniversary, the president of the France-China Friendship Group of the French National Assembly heaped praise on … Chinese alternative medicine.
It’s worth a full quote: “I immediately had a very strong interest in acupuncture. Why? Because I had this sensitivity to consider health from a holistic point of view, meaning our health should not only take into account psychological and physical dimensions, but also the influence of the environment,” Éric Alauzet said. Keep reading the very important news here.
Remembering de Gaulle: Chinese Ambassador to Paris Lu Shaye visited Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, where late President Charles de Gaulle lived, to commemorate the man who became the first in the West to establish diplomatic ties with Maoist China. “Gaullism has a broad and profound connotation, but the most profound core is of independence,” Lu said.
Here comes the constitutional arbiter: “We do not want a bloc policy, with the risks of conflicts that this entails,” Laurent Fabius, president of the French Constitutional Council and former foreign minister, told Chinese state media Xinhua.
Welcome, foreign minister … and president: Chinese chief diplomat Wang Yi is expected to visit France next month, when he’ll also attend the Munich Security Conference. His task will most likely include finalizing plans for Xi to visit France in either March or the fall, which will be his first trip to Europe since the Covid pandemic.
LITHUANIA, AGAIN
EU PUTS WTO LITIGATION AGAINST CHINA ON HOLD, FOR NOW: The EU has suspended its dispute against China at the World Trade Organization over a de facto trade embargo against Lithuania. The Geneva-based trade body circulated a note to its members late Friday, saying Brussels had requested to "immediately suspend its proceedings" with Beijing.
Lawyers need to buy time: According to a person familiar with the case, the EU made the decision to suspend as the clock was ticking whereas the EU lawyers believed they would need more evidence, so they made a decision to put the case on hold. According to the WTO notice, the case can be suspended “for a period not exceeding 12 months,” or the panel will collapse. The European Commission said it wouldn’t comment further beyond the WTO notice.
Background: The bloc launched its WTO dispute in early 2022 because Beijing imposed trade restrictions on Lithuania after Vilnius deepened its ties with Taiwan, which China claims as its own territory. The case was an irritant for EU-China relations, with the EU accusing China of discrimination and coercion against Lithuania and subsequently rolling out its own anti-coercion instrument, partly inspired by this saga.
NO VISA: In the meantime, Lithuania reported yet more trouble with China. According to Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis, the Chinese mission in Vilnius has stopped issuing visas to Lithuanian applicants. LRT has more.
TRANSLATING WASHINGTON
BILATERAL COUNTERNARCOTICS WORKING GROUP FINALLY LAUNCHES: A bilateral counternarcotics working group agreed to by President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in November will convene its first meetings today and tomorrow in Beijing. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi "welcomed advances in cooperation on counternarcotics issues, including the launch of the U.S.-China Counternarcotics Working Group on January 30," during two days of meetings last week, the White House said in a statement on Saturday. The U.S. delegation "includes high-level officials from the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice, Department of State and the Department of the Treasury," National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement on Sunday.
The Biden administration plans to use the group as a focal point for "continued pressure, continued dialogue, ensuring that we continue to push and encourage joint law enforcement actions" against Chinese firms that provide the majority of the precursor chemicals used in the fentanyl that ends up on U.S. city streets, a senior administration official told reporters on Sunday. U.S. officials will also push their Chinese counterparts to impose "know your customer" rules for Chinese chemical exporters to prevent "diversion of some of these dual-use chemicals to cartels and other customers that are known bad actors," the official said.
That collaboration aims to "achieve remarkable results in combating fentanyl substances, including precursors," deputy director of China's National Narcotic Control Commission, Yu Haibin said on Friday, per NBC News. Yu's comments contrast with those he made in June in which he blamed the U.S. for "shifting blame on other countries" for the country's opioid overdose epidemic and instead urged reduction in U.S. "domestic demand and supply" of fentanyl.
CHINA'S AMBASSADOR: 'YES' TO YOUTH TIES: Beijing is backing Chinese leader Xi Jinping's rhetoric about inviting 50,000 young Americans to China in the next five years with a plan to make that happen. "China will set up a YES program — the Young Envoys Scholarship, and encourage diverse forms of cooperation, such as exchange programs between schools, short visits, summer schools and winter camps," China's Ambassador to the U.S., Xie Feng, said in a post on X on Sunday. Xie gave no details on funding for the program. A major challenge to "YES": the State Department's "no" in the form of a Level Three Travel Advisory for China that urges U.S. citizens to "reconsider travel to Mainland China due to the arbitrary enforcement of local laws, including in relation to exit bans, and the risk of wrongful detentions."
BEIJING UNHELPFUL ON RED SEA ATTACKS: The U.S. failed in two days of talks to prod China into pressuring Iran to stop Houthi attacks on commercial shipping in the Red Sea, an administration official said Saturday.
Sullivan raised U.S. concerns about the ongoing attacks in the meetings with Wang, the top Chinese envoy, in Bangkok, Thailand, on Friday and Saturday. But the talks ended with no sign that China is willing to take decisive steps to use its economic influence on Iran — which funds and equips Yemen's Houthi militia — to stem the threat to global supply chains. Phelim has the full story here.
CHINA SLAMS SPACE FORCE: Beijing condemned what it called Pentagon efforts to peddle fears of China's space program to cover up U.S. efforts to weaponize "space technology" including satellites. "The U.S. has long been repeatedly hyping up China as a 'threat in outer space' to smear and attack China, which is only an excuse for the U.S. to expand its forces in outer space and maintain military hegemony," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said on Friday. Wang's screed was in response to a question by state media tabloid Global Times about the U.S. Space Force's assessment in a recent report that "China and Russia are testing and developing anti-satellite weapons to deny, disrupt or destroy satellites and space services." Space Force didn't respond to a request for comment.
MORE HEADLINES
BBC: China warns citizens against ‘exotic beauty’ traps of foreign spies.
FINANCIAL TIMES: Western nations need a plan for when China floods the chip market.
NEW YORK TIMES: What China's EV city says about the state of the economy.
REUTERS: China’s growth model pushes Beijing into more trade conflicts.
WALL STREET JOURNAL: Vatican-China rapprochement resumes with bishop consecrations.
MANY THANKS: To editor Christian Oliver, reporter Laura Kayali and producer Seb Starcevic.
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