Germany\u2019s new chancellor, Friedrich Merz, said on Wednesday that his country\u2019s ties with China are being \u201cshaped by systemic rivalry and power politics\u201d, in a first major speech to the Bundestag that suggested a tougher approach that would press Beijing to be more accountable on geopolitical issues.<\/p>\n
Merz, a conservative who took up the role as chancellor last week, flagged China\u2019s relations with Russia as an area of \u201cgreat concern\u201d and said he would pursue \u201cstrategic de-risking\u201d with the world\u2019s second-largest economy.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe observe that in China\u2019s foreign policy actions the elements of systemic rivalry are on the rise,\u201d Merz said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe view the growing closeness between Beijing and Moscow with a great deal of concern.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will push determinedly for China to make its contribution toward ending the war in Ukraine,\u201d Merz said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will embed our China policy in a regional approach. A stable, free and secure Indo-Pacific is for Germany and for the EU of great strategic importance.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Germany\u2019s new chancellor, Friedrich Merz, said on Wednesday that his country\u2019s ties with China are being \u201cshaped by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[2574,1395,32,2000,299,2557,1699,1945,1824,7337,332,29138,47096,657,1220],"class_list":{"0":"post-101823","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-berlin","9":"tag-china","10":"tag-donald-trump","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-european-commission","14":"tag-european-union","15":"tag-friedrich-merz","16":"tag-germany","17":"tag-olaf-scholz","18":"tag-russia","19":"tag-social-democratic-party","20":"tag-systemic-rivalry","21":"tag-ukraine","22":"tag-ursula-von-der-leyen"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114508341550417965","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}