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Central Europe
April 19, 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 14
China pledges to boost trade and infrastructure ties with CEE countries
Levente Szilagyi in Budapest
China promised to boost trade ties and to increase financial support for infrastructure projects in Central and Southeast Europe at the annual summit meeting of 16 countries in the region in Dubrovnik on April 12.
The 8th China 16+1 summit kicked off in the Croatian coastal town of Dubrovnik on Thursday with 16 countries and ended with Greece joining as a full-fledged participant. It is the 12th EU state to join the initiative.
Greece joining the group was an obvious decision as China's largest state-owned shipping company COSCO had taken over the Greek port of Piraeus, the main entry point for Chinese goods to Europe, analysts said.
China and the CEE states established a platform called 16+1 cooperation for the institutional coor- dination of their relations in 2012 under the frame- work of the grandiose One Belt One Road plan.
Besides Greece, the initiative brings together 11 EU member states (Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia) and five Western Balkan states (Albania, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia).
On Friday, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang visited the construction site of the Peljesac Bridge, which is one of the largest infrastructure projects in Croa- tia, with his host Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic. It is a model of tripartite cooperation among China, the EU, and Croatia, he said.
The consortium led by China Road and Bridge Cor- poration (CRBC) won the bid for the first phase the
Host Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic flanked by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang (L) and Alexis Tsipras, prime minister of Greece, which joined the initiative as a fully-fledged participant.
project, the total value of which is about €420mn, of which 85% will be covered by the EU funds.
At the summit, Premier Li stressed the importance of reciprocal opening-up of the market. He said China will make further efforts to facilitate trade, including simplifying customs procedures and providing green channels for the export of products from CEE countries.
Foreign enterprises registered in China, enterprises from Central and Eastern European countries in- cluded, will also enjoy the tax cuts policy, he added.
China has invested about $10bn in the 16 CEE countries, while the reverse figure is around $1.5bn, the Hungarian state news agency reported. Trade between China and the region has jumped by 50% since the cooperation began six years ago and reached $82.2bn in 2018, up 21% from 2017.
Poland and Hungary were the main initiators of the 16+1 Initiative as both countries aspire to become a hub in the transportation corridors between China and Europe. Hungary has a long history of backing China against the EU's plans.
Hungary's self-declared illiberal Prime Minister Viktor Orban has sought to strengthen ties with China as part of the "Eastern Opening" policy launched in 2012, but his endeavours to shift Hun- gary’s economic and political focus from Western Europe to Asia has yielded little success so far. Hungary's economy remains deeply embedded in EU and trade with non-EU members have grown little since his policy shift was unveiled.
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