In November 2013, at the Bucharest Summit of the 16+1 initiative, China, Hungary, and Serbia talked about building a high-speed railway that would connect Belgrade to Budapest (respectively the capitals of Serbia and Hungary). The announcement happened just one month after Chinese President Xi Jinping put forward the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and [...]
Thirty years of independence from communism and the Soviet Union have also meant 30 years of fear of a Russian invasion for Central and Eastern European countries. As a result, these countries have spent three decades consolidating relations with the United States and NATO — both of which they see as possible saviors in [...]
China is slowly losing Europe. This is happening even though transatlantic relations are at a low point and right when the European Union is finally aiming to become a global geopolitical player. Ursula von der Leyen, the new president of the European Commission, has made it clear over the past months that she wants [...]
The latest confrontation between the United States and China officially started with the trade war in 2018. The time since then has reminded us just how different the two countries are and how difficult it has become to reach a compromise. While the West would like to preserve the current world order and strengthen [...]
When it was launched by China and 16 countries from Central and Eastern Europe in 2012, the 16+1 mechanism sparked hope throughout the region that it could close the investment gap. The figures being bandied about were huge in 2012. Then-Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao announced a $10 billion credit line for Chinese investments in Central and [...]
A route that spans around Eurasia, an infrastructure project that encompasses over 70 countries, a branding strategy, are just some of the ways in which the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has been described until now. But the narrative has begun to change lately. From a beneficial strategy, the BRI has become a bogeyman [...]
All European roads no longer lead to Rome, but Beijing, with Emmanuel Macron, Theresa May, Mark Rutte and Angela Merkel travelling to the capital of the European Union’s largest trade partner. But the European leaders didn’t go to China just to make a new friend; Europe has a few grievances for Beijing to address. [...]
Following the visit of the French president, Emmanuel Macron, at the beginning of January, Chinese leaders welcomed another major state visit from a European official: the British prime minister, Theresa May. While Macron is seeking to strengthen his position as a leader of the European Union and the voice of Europe, May is more [...]
Throughout the past half-century, the driving force of globalization and the creation of a rules-based order has been the North Atlantic partnership between the United States and Europe. But in the past six months, the paths of America and Europe have diverged on everything from trade and climate change to preserving an open, multilateral [...]
On April 18, Beijing hosted the 7th European Union-China Strategic Dialogue which was chaired by Federica Mogherini, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, with Chinese State Councilor, Yang Jiechi. The meeting came ahead of the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation scheduled to take place in Beijing in mid-May [...]