Steinmeier in China: confident regarding trade disputes
To round off his state visit to China, Federal President Steinmeier is meeting Prime Minister Li Qiang and head of state Xi Jinping. China’s large trade surplus was among the matters discussed.
Beijing (dpa) – Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier is confident that Germany and China will be able to solve their disagreements in trade-related matters. At the start of his conversation with the Chinese Prime Minister Li Qiang in Beijing, he said that the recently reached agreement concerning the limitation of exports of hybrid cars to the EU had shown that there were “ways of finding solutions” to difficult issues.
Mr Steinmeier directly addressed the increased imbalance in the two countries’ bilateral trade relations. China’s trade surplus compared to Germany was almost 90 billion euros in the past year.
China’s head of state Xi Jinping later welcomed Mr Steinmeier with a formal ceremony on the square by the eastern gate of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Xi Jinping have known each other for close to two decades from Mr Steinmeier’s work as foreign minister.
In a speech he delivered at Peking University, Mr Steinmeier had earlier called on both countries to work together to strengthen the rules-based international order and promote peace and free global trade. This trip is the first visit of a German Federal President to China in almost eight years.
