Clearly Opposite Investment Agreement with China Clearly

Of: TT

Published: December 30, 2020 at 3:16 p.m.

EU member states and China have agreed on the framework for the investment deal with China negotiated for several years.

The agreement aims to give European companies better access to the giant market in the east.

The president of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, affirms on Twitter that the parties have reached the framework agreement to guarantee more balanced commercial and commercial opportunities.

Chinese President Xi Jinping says the deal will lead to larger markets for both Chinese and European investments.

The agreement demonstrates China’s determination and confidence to become more transparent, he says, adding that the agreement will stimulate the world economy as it recovers from the effects of the corona pandemic.

Human rights

The agreement comes despite questions about China’s attitude towards workers’ conditions and human rights. According to Brussels, China will now work to implement the international standards of the UN Labor Organization, ILO, which have already been ratified by the country, and will also work to ratify basic ILO standards, including forced labor, reports the AFP news agency.

Under the agreement, European companies will be able to operate in China in various industries, including electric cars, hospitals, real estate, flight reservation systems, advertising and shipping. Certain requirements for companies to operate with Chinese partners will be removed.

Companies Volkswagen, BMW, Allianz, Siemens and Peugeot, among others, are expected to benefit from the deal.

Web summit

The agreement came after a web summit between Xi Jinping, Ursula von der Leyen and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

– This is an important agreement for the EU and China. It is also an important agreement for Sweden. Now the EU and China must first agree on a general level, said Foreign Trade Minister Anna Hallberg (S) at a Brexit press conference earlier this day.

A committee has been formed to ensure the agreement is honored and to resolve any disputes.

However, despite the agreement, it will take months to formulate the legal details of the final texts. The agreement will then be ratified, which means the process will likely take another year.

Germany has moved on

Negotiations have been ongoing since 2014. In addition to purely commercial issues, which included intellectual property rights, they have been overshadowed by different views on human rights, the Hong Kong democracy movement, freedom of expression and industrial espionage.

But Germany, which until the turn of the year presides over the EU Council of Ministers, has pushed for the investment agreement to materialize. At an ambassador-level meeting on Monday, Berlin announced that no member had objected and that “the path to political approval (of the agreement) is open,” said a diplomat from the AFP agency.

The diplomat added that a “positive development” in recent talks on forced labor in Chinese agriculture has helped to untie knots.

Published: December 30, 2020 at 3:16 p.m.