The president of China, Xi Jinping, arrived this Sunday (05/05/2024) in Paris for a state visit that will last until Tuesday and is expected to have a strong political and economic content, due to the growing trade tensions between the European Union and Beijing, in addition to the war unleashed by Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, in February 2022.
The Chinese president landed at Orly airport, south of Paris, where he was received by French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal. The official agenda for Xi’s visit, in practice, begins on Monday at mid-morning, when he will be received at the Elysee Palace by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, who for the occasion will be accompanied by the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.
It is Xi’s first European tour since 2019, when the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic isolated the Asian giant from the world for almost three years. The visit will be carried out under the seal of diplomatic balance, with a stop in France, which for a year has been asking China to use its influence to make “Russia see reason”, and other stops in Serbia and Hungary, two countries near Moscow.
“He is neither a party nor a participant”
Macron will defend commercial “reciprocity” and the search for a solution to the war in Ukraine against a president who shows his support for Russia, and with the presence of Von der Leyen he seeks to clearly express that the discussion on economic and commercial disputes with China are not carried out only with France, but with the entire European Union.
In the afternoon there will be two formal events and a statement to the press, without questions. On Tuesday the dialogue will continue in the Pyrenees, in an attempt to offer Xi a more relaxed framework. The Chinese president, meanwhile, pointed out through an article published in The Figaro that he hopes to collaborate to find ways to resolve the war unleashed by Russia in Ukraine, and stressed that his country “is neither a party nor a participant” in the conflict.
DZC (EFE, AFP)
