China tells EU Commission president to get better speechwriter
"European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s speech ahead of her visit to China was incoherent, contradictory, and misinterpreted Beijing’s policies and positions, the Chinese ambassador to the EU said on Friday.
“I was a little bit disappointed,” Fu Cong told the news network CGTN. “That speech contained a lot of misrepresentation and misinterpretation of Chinese policies and Chinese positions. And I would say that whoever wrote that speech for President von der Leyen does not really understand China, or deliberately distorted Chinese positions.”
Von der Leyen gave off the impression of realizing the importance of engaging with China on the one hand, but being “fearful of criticism, especially from hardliners in Europe and maybe even from the US,” on the other, Fu added. Reading the speech, it seems “as if two people are quarreling with each other, so there is no coherence.”
“We do hope that in her visit to China and in her dialogue with the Chinese leaders, she will be able to understand China better,” the ambassador concluded.
Von der Leyen is scheduled to accompany French President Emmanuel Macron to Beijing next week, where they are expected to meet with President Xi Jinping.
Speaking at the European Policy Center on Thursday, Von der Leyen said the EU needed to “stress-test” and “de-risk” its relations with Beijing, both political and economic, and argued that a “decoupling” from China was neither a viable strategy nor in the bloc’s interest. On the other hand, she argued Brussels needed to be “bolder” in its approach to China, which she described as becoming “more repressive at home and more assertive abroad.”
Von der Leyen also warned that the “determining factor for EU-China relations going forward” will be how Beijing “continues to interact with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s war,” meaning the conflict in Ukraine.
China has insisted on neutrality in the conflict, condemned the unilateral Western sanctions as illegitimate, and proposed a peace plan. The EU has fully endorsed the government in Kiev and supplied it with billions of euros worth of weapons, ammunition, training and other equipment.
Wang Luton, the director for European affairs at the Chinese Foreign Ministry, also commented on von der Leyen’s remarks. He tweeted on his personal account that the EU “talks a lot about de-risking recently,” but is actually creating risk by “linking trade with ideology and national security and creating bloc confrontation.”
Von der Leyen in line for NATO’s top job – The Sun
"European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is “in the running” to replace Jens Stoltenberg, whose term as NATO secretary general expires in October, British newspaper The Sun reported on Friday, citing a diplomatic source.
According to the tabloid, “a number of NATO members” proposed von der Leyen’s candidacy for the bloc’s top job. However, the newspaper also cited UK sources as saying that London “would likely veto” the move because of “her poor track record in charge of Germany’s Armed Forces” during her tenure as defense minister.
> The newspaper reported British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is backing Ben Wallace, the country’s defense secretary, for NATO’s top post. Wallace said in a radio interview in February that he was happy with his current position, adding that leading NATO would be “a great job as well.”
> The report named Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas and Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland as other possible candidates. The Sun added that Kallas has reportedly declined to be nominated and that Freeland, whose mother is Ukrainian, was “unlikely” to succeed because Ottawa has so far failed to meet the NATO target of spending 2% of GDP on defense.
Von der Leyen was appointed as the EU’s top executive in 2019. Her six years as Germany’s defense minister was plagued by shortages and delays in the delivery of Bundeswehr equipment. “The army’s readiness to deploy has not improved in recent years, but instead has got even worse,” parliamentary armed forces commissioner Hans-Peter Bartels said in 2018.
Von der Leyen spearheaded the European bloc’s anti-Russia sanctions and joint efforts to train and equip the Ukrainian military. She has also called on EU members to take a tougher stance when dealing with China.
The NATO secretary general is appointed for an initial term of four years, after consultations among member states.
Stoltenberg’s tenure was extended for an extra year shortly after an armed conflict broke out between Russia and Ukraine in February 2022. The spokeswoman for the US-led military bloc confirmed earlier this year that the outgoing secretary general, who is Norwegian, was not planning further extensions of his mandate."
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