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Merkel’s China Trip Focuses on Economy, Not Rights | |
(about 11 hours later) | |
SHANGHAI — Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany headed home on Friday from a two-day visit to China with a stack of newly signed business contracts and a pledge for Beijing’s backing in the euro crisis, but few promises from Beijing to improve human rights. | |
Ms. Merkel, seven members of her cabinet and several dozen representatives of Germany’s largest companies visited China at the invitation of Prime Minister Wen Jiabao as both countries faced the prospect of slower growth and weakening demand for their exports, pushing economic concerns to the forefront. | |
At the heart of Ms. Merkel’s concerns were winning support from Mr. Wen and the man expected to succeed him early next year, Li Keqiang, in buying up more European debt in an effort to ease the sovereign debt crisis, which has been crippling Europe for three years and causing uncertainty in global markets. | |
Although members of the Chinese delegation made it clear they had little understanding of how long it took Europeans to draw up new agreements to fight the crisis and “did not hold back” during intense talks about the euro, according to dpa, a German news agency, Mr. Wen said his country intended to invest in more European debt. | |
The chancellor also met with President Hu Jintao and his expected successor, Xi Jinping, while in Beijing on Thursday, and posed for a photograph with Mr. Wen with the Forbidden City in the background. | |
Yet the chancellor’s efforts to underline what both sides have dubbed their “special relationship” came under fire from critics at home, who recall her previous willingness to risk Germany’s economic interest to highlight China’s poor record on human rights issues. In 2007, she invited the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibet, to the chancellery for talks, prompting an angry response from Beijing. | |
A summary of Ms. Merkel’s trip ran under the headline “The Domesticated Chancellor” in the online version of Der Spiegel on Friday, and the conservative newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung warned of the danger of believing that the two countries’ relationship could be defined by economic ties alone. | |
“No matter how dynamically the relation develops in terms of trade and investment,” said an editorial published in the paper on Thursday, “there can never be a ‘special relationship’ between the Communist People’s Republic and Germany, a democratic country in the heart of the European Union, at least not in the sense of the Anglo-American connection.” | |
One of the sharpest critics of the chancellor, however, was in Beijing. The artist provocateur Ai Weiwei, who has a strong following in Germany, began poking fun at Ms. Merkel and posting comments on the Internet to show his disappointment at not being invited to meet her for lunch. He even posted pictures of himself striding outside, wearing Chinese slippers and carrying a cardboard cutout of Ms. Merkel through his garden. He called it “Taking Merkel to Lunch.” | |
Human rights issues may have been largely ignored on this visit, but economic ties have flourished since the two countries began a program of annual governmental exchanges in 2010. On this trip, German executives signed contracts worth more than 4.8 billion euros, or $6 billion, including an order for Airbus, a French-German venture, for 50 jets worth more than $4.4 billion. | |
Still, disagreements over trade, transparency and access to China’s lucrative domestic market remain. Ms. Merkel said on Thursday that she favored negotiation in a trade dispute in which Germany’s largest producer of solar panels is accusing China of dumping low-cost panels in Europe. | |
During a visit to Mr. Wen’s home city, Tianjin, outside Beijing, she made it clear that Chinese companies needed to recognize that subsidies distorted competition and violated European law. | |
“My plea is that everyone be transparent, that they lay their cards on the table about how they produce,” the chancellor said, Reuters reported. Europe’s trade commissioner is expected to decide next week whether to take up the case. | |
At a meeting with German business leaders, Mr. Wen sought to assuage concerns that their subsidiaries based in China were not treated the same as domestic companies. | |
“Fair access to the markets through the access of our subsidiaries as Chinese companies is close to our hearts,” Peter Löscher, the chief executive of Siemens, told the prime minister, dpa reported. | |
Mr. Wen responded by inviting complaints and promising to address any concerns that reached him in writing. | |
Experts on China say Beijing is eager to have Europe welcome more Chinese investment in major areas, not just in the debt market. | |
“The significance of this visit lies primarily in the bilateral economic relations,” said Shi Yinhong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing and an adviser to the State Council, or cabinet. “There has been a lot of discussion over China providing financial assistance to Europe. But Germany cannot solely represent Europe, and Europe as an integrated entity still has some concern over receiving Chinese assistance.” | “The significance of this visit lies primarily in the bilateral economic relations,” said Shi Yinhong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing and an adviser to the State Council, or cabinet. “There has been a lot of discussion over China providing financial assistance to Europe. But Germany cannot solely represent Europe, and Europe as an integrated entity still has some concern over receiving Chinese assistance.” |
David Barboza reported from Shanghai, and Melissa Eddy from Berlin. | |