Xi finds five years has changed Europe

XI JINPING made his last high-profile visit to Europe in 2019, pre-pandemic, and was feted. Fast forward five years, however, and much of the continent is in a different political space towards Beijing.

To be sure, the Chinese president received a respectful, warm welcome in France on Monday (May 6) and Tuesday this week, the 60th anniversary of France-China diplomatic relations, where he met President Emmanuel Macron and also European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. But the underlying political mood music is different from 2019.

Back then, what seems a “long” half decade ago, Xi was love-bombed by his then-Italian hosts who became the first G7 leaders to sign up for Beijing’s Belt and Road infrastructure scheme. Even then, this was a controversial decision within the West that infuriated the then-Trump administration, which called it “legitimacy for China’s infrastructure vanity project”, and was last year reversed by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s administration currently in power in Rome.