On May 5, Chinese leader Xi Jinping is on an official visit to Paris. In the last five years, this is the first trip of the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China to Europe. Xi will meet with French President Emmanuel Macron. The leaders of the states should discuss reducing the trade imbalance. In addition, it will be about using China’s influence on Russia to end the war in Ukraine.
“Given that China is one of Russia’s main partners, our task is to use Beijing’s leverage over Moscow in order to change Russia’s approach and contribute to the resolution of the conflict,” the spokesman said on the eve of the meeting Elysee Palace.
France has also tried to push China to put pressure on Moscow to stop hostilities in Ukraine. However, Paris has so far been unable to achieve significant success on this issue, with the exception of Xi’s decision to call Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi for the first time shortly after Macron visited Beijing last year.
We will remind that there is currently a crisis in the economic relations between China and the EU. France supports European Union investigation into Chinese electric car exports. In addition, in January, Beijing launched an investigation into the importation of brandy, mostly French-made. The move is seen as retaliation for a number of EU investigations against Chinese businesses.
