Schulz on the meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping

Press Release
Brussels -
31-03-2014
Foreign Affairs - Human Rights

Commenting on the meeting with the President of the People's Republic of China Xi Jinping, the President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz stated:

“The unprecedented visit of President Xi Jinping to the European Parliament and European institutions is both welcome and timely. It illustrates the importance that the new Chinese leader attaches to healthy EU-China relations and to the European Parliament.

EU-China relations still offer great untapped potential. China and the EU trade is worth more than 1 billion euro daily, but our exchanges are overwhelmingly concentrated in goods. China and the EU must be engines for sustainable growth and job creation in the years to come. Mutual opening to services and investments will be essential for this.

International trade is an exclusive competence of the European Union. Gathering the sufficient support of the European Parliament in all future commercial negotiations - including the bilateral investment agreement currently being discussed - will be necessary.

For our relations to flourish, dialogue and trust must be reinforced in all their dimensions: political, parliamentary, commercial and human rights. President Xi Jinping and I agreed that in every growing partnership, such as for EU and China, differences and difficulties exist, but dialogue is the way to address them. The visit of President Xi Jinping is a clear signal of the commitment of the Chinese leadership to an open and direct dialogue, on all outstanding issues.

As the success of recent negotiations has shown, cooperation and conciliation both bilaterally and via international institutions are viable and mutually beneficial. This is the path that we must pursue.

I described the measures taken by the European Union during the economic and financial crisis and the prospects for the recovery in Europe, and praised the supportive role played by China in the midst of the crisis. We also discussed foreign relations and I described the measures taken by the European Union to de-escalate the crisis in Ukraine and to uphold Ukraine's territorial integrity and sovereignty."

For further information:

europarl.president.press@europarl.europa.eu