Chinese ports start blocking Lithuanian goods – media

29 comments
  1. Lithuanian exporters have reported they cannot clear their goods through Chinese customs after the country was apparently dropped from China’s customs registry.

    15min.lt reported on Thursday that a Lithuanian company exporting wood to China was not allowed to unload in one of the country’s ports.

    The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry has also confirmed to BNS that Lithuanian exporters are facing issues in China.

    “The ministry has been informed about possible disruptions for Lithuanian production in China, we are in contact with Lithuanian firms, we are collecting information from Chinese side about the restrictions, we are also in touch with the European Commission about a reaction on the EU level,” the Foreign Ministry said in a comment.

    According to 15min.lt, Lithuania has been removed from China’s customs registry, which prevents Lithuanian goods from getting customs clearance.

    “Lithuania has been crossed out […], it seems that there’s no such country in China’s customs system,” it quotes Vidmantas Janulevičius, president of the Lithuanian Confederation of Industrialists. “This causes problems for exporters, who cannot ship their remaining cargo.”

    Beijing has been protesting Lithuania’s decision to open a representation office of Taiwan, a self-ruled island that it considers to be part of China.

    In November, Beijing downgraded its diplomatic representation in Vilnius. Lithuanian firms have previously reported difficulties exporting and doing business in China.

    https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/1555667/chinese-ports-start-blocking-lithuanian-goods-media

  2. The EU must act since trade is an EU competence.

    EU companies should be able to use an EU address when shipping. China wouldn’t dare risking a trade war.

  3. ? I thought this was one of the things that was central to the EU, trade equality between EU countries? You trade with all of us or none of us?

    So, China is isolating Lithuania, and Germany won’t say a peep?

    I’m guessing Lithuania is a second or third tier EU country. If Italy or Netherlands were being treated this way, you’d get an EU wide response, but this is, well, just Lithuania. The EU should probably publish a list of who you can isolate and who you can’t.

  4. I mean what did Lithuania really get besides upvotes from redditors? As far as I know even the US did not follow Lithuania’s move to change the embassy’s name. Let alone other European countries.

    Even Taiwan itself has [free trade deal](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_Cooperation_Framework_Agreement) with China and exports 45% of its total productions to China. Maybe Taiwan’s pro-China-unification wing will come to the power again after next election circle just like 2008 and 2012. People are sometimes too unfamiliar and naive about the cross-strait affairs.

  5. China somehow reminds me of that Seinfeld character, “The Soup Nazi”…

    Easy to piss off, petty and vindictive.

    “No business for you!”

    “No customs for you!”

    “No human rights for you!”

    And this will only get worse, and worse, and more and more ridiculous, until at some time in the future a final straw will break the camel’s back. I hope that happens sooner than later.

    I hope all they accomplish this way is that they will be known as an unreliable trading partner. I hope they realise that with such stupid, childish behaviour, no one can really take them seriously on an international level.

    Lithuania should drop out of Chinese markets entirely, and so should the rest of the world. We don’t need that kind of bullshit.

  6. The entire EU should have embassies in Taiwan. Let’s see if they will delete the entire EU and collapse their own economy.

  7. A cynic in me expects to see, in a year or two, some sort of terror act in Lithuania. It would be first ever and it would turn out to be financed, in some convoluted way, by the CCP. As always with these kind of thoughts I hope I’m wrong.

  8. They can do whatever they want to Lithuania, it’s a small country, but China must realize they need to trade with other, bigger, countries as well.

    For instance, they [import 58.2% of the world’s soybeans](https://oec.world/en/profile/hs92/soybeans), and about 80% of the world’s soybeans are produced by two countries, Brazil and the USA.

  9. I wonder if the EU might have a collective response to EU goods being blocked in this way. Or is that being too hopeful? Maybe.

  10. Can someone explain to me why this is happening? I can see that they don’t have Lithuania on the customs registry but I have no idea why they would do that and why to Lithuania in particular??

  11. I wonder whose behind this anti-china movement in Lithuania, beacuse they are making everything but their people’s interest haha

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