China 'to play its part' in euro zone debt crisis
Wen says both China and EU against trade protectionism
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said Thursday that Beijing will maintain its efforts to help resolve the euro zone debt crisis, after months of investing in European sovereign bonds.
“China will continue to play its part in helping resolve the European debt issue through appropriate channels,” Wen told a business summit after political talks with European Union leaders in Brussels.
“In the past few months China has continued to invest in bonds of European governments... and discussed ways of cooperation with the ESM,” Wen said, referring to the European Stability Mechanism, a new 500-billion-euro rescue firewall set up by euro zone leaders and due to become operational next month.
“Europe is on the right track in tackling its debt issue,” Wen told the audience. “What is crucial now is to fully implement the reforms” it has agreed on economic governance, he said.
Wen’s remarks saw a shift in tone from the “serious concerns” about spillover effects hurting China that he had expressed just three weeks earlier when German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited Beijing.
Almost half of all European exports to China come from Germany, and a quarter of all European imports from China are into Germany.