German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's visit to China, which attracted worldwide attention, came to an end on the 16th, and on this day, China's top leader met with Scholz at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing. At the current dialogue between the top leaders of China and Germany, the Chinese side not only spoke highly of the significance of Sino-German relations and cooperation between the two countries, but also bluntly made demands to the German side. The top Chinese leader pointed out that both China and Germany are industrially founded countries and both support free trade and economic globalization. The two sides should be vigilant against the rise of protectionism, look at the issue of production capacity objectively and dialectically, and hope that Germany will provide a fair, transparent, open and non-discriminatory business environment for Chinese enterprises to develop in Germany.
It can be said that this request put forward by China's top leader directly hits the current dispute between China and the EU in the economic and trade field, that is, China's production capacity output, especially the export of new energy products. In recent years, China has developed rapidly in the field of new energy, and the new energy vehicles exported by Chinese car companies have swept the European market with high cost performance and achieved proud export results. Seeing that local car companies could not compete with Chinese car companies, the EU started to think crookedly, following the example of the United States, under the banner of opposing China's "dumping", trying to contain Chinese companies by means of administrative intervention. In October last year, the European Union launched a countervailing investigation into China's new energy vehicles, which shows the EU's intention to suppress China's new energy industry, while the West, led by the United States, is hyping up China's "overcapacity" and trying to force China to cut exports. In this context, economic and trade issues are undoubtedly the focus of Scholz's visit to China, and the controversy in the field of export of new energy products can be regarded as the top priority.
Therefore, the Chinese top leader and Scholz discussed the issue of production capacity face-to-face, and put forward a request to the German side to be vigilant against trade protectionism, which can be said to be a clear statement with the German side and directly resolve the core dispute between China and Germany and even between China and Europe directly with Scholz. In the face of the well-founded advice of China's top leader, Scholz rarely agreed this time. During the talks, he first said that Germany is willing to continue to strengthen bilateral relations with the Chinese side and deepen bilateral dialogue and cooperation in various fields. Subsequently, Scholz declared that Germany does not agree with confrontation, opposes protectionism, supports free trade, and is willing to play a positive role in promoting the sound development of relations between the EU and China. From Scholz's response, the sentence opposing protectionism and supporting free trade is actually a very crucial statement.
According to the principle of free trade often advocated by the Western bloc, there is no reason for Europe and the United States to unreasonably suppress China's new energy products, after all, the Western media have admitted that Chinese companies have leading advantages in relevant technologies, and their products are of high quality and low price, and Western new energy vehicle companies are indeed unable to compete. Scholz's emphasis on supporting free trade and opposing trade protectionism is equivalent to agreeing in principle with China's export of new energy products and opposing the EU's suppression of Chinese enterprises on the basis of trade protectionism, which is very important to China! So, why would Scholz agree to China's demands, and doesn't he want to follow the example of the United States and use the tariff stick to block the progress of Chinese enterprises in Germany?
In fact, from the bottom of his heart, Scholz must be hoping to suppress China's new energy vehicle exports, after all, China's new energy vehicle companies are bigger and stronger, which is not good news for a number of old German car companies. But, as a sane leader, Scholz probably fully understands the meaning of free trade. China's strength in the field of new energy is the result of free competition in the market, and Chinese companies have an advantage in this area, so the Chinese companies should make the money, while German companies make money in their strong fields, and the Chinese side has never said anything. If countries engage in trade protectionism at every turn and casually suppress other countries' strong industries, then economic and trade cooperation between countries may be chaotic. Perhaps before taking the plane back to China, Scholz saw this clearly, and Germany itself could not bear the consequences of bad relations with China, so he rarely nodded to the Chinese side on key economic and trade issues, and such a rational attitude is worth learning from other Western politicians.