EU-US trade and tech negotiators meet in Paris to tighten screws on autocrats, including China and Russia
- Allusions to China peppered throughout a joint statement seen by the Post, including the group’s efforts to help ‘eradicate forced labour’
- Technology is being used to ‘perpetrate human rights violations and abuses, engage in forms of repression and undermine the security of other nations’, they say
In sun-drenched Paris on Sunday, EU and US officials fine-tuned a blueprint to counter what they see as autocrats’ efforts to harness trade and technology for nefarious means.
A joint statement seen by the South China Morning Post, to be released after the second meeting of the Trade and Technology Council (TTC) on Monday, contains only a single nod to Beijing, in reference to its dominance of the rare earth minerals market, and many mentions of Russia.
But there are obvious allusions to China peppered throughout.
Among the agreements thrashed out in Paris was the establishment of a tripartite dialogue on trade and labour between the EU, US and civil society that will work to “eradicate forced labour”.
EU trade chief Valdis Dombrovskis told reporters after a day of meetings with US counterparts that the allies would “crowdsource discussions on what are the best approaches” to ban the practice, which has become a major concern amid allegations of widespread forced labour in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
Also with China in mind, the EU and US will cooperate to “diversify supply chains for rare earth magnets” and “advance [the] transparency in and diversification” in the solar sector.
“Ninety per cent of solar panels come from China. Is that the right thing to do, or is that the right dependency or not? And what can we do about it?” asked a senior EU official, speaking on background to discuss the agenda.
Other parts of the text vow to outmuscle authoritarians on technology, which is being used to “perpetrate human rights violations and abuses, engage in forms of repression and undermine the security of other nations”, according the text.
Lawmakers pressure EU for full ban on trade of forced labour goods
The council wants to set the rules of the road for advanced technology like artificial intelligence, 6G and beyond so they cannot be used as “tools of repression” and “arbitrary or surveillance, coercion and cyber threats”.
Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s commissioner for competition and digital issues, said China was not being targeting directly, but admitted that the subtext was clear.
“There are things here that I think non-market economies will not like. There are things here – whether it’s to use technology for blanket surveillance of their citizens – they will not like either,” she said on Sunday, before being whisked off in a police-led convoy for dinner with US counterparts.
In the run-up to Monday’s summit, EU officials have been at pains to stress that the council is not about China – even if the US sees things differently.
“It’s clear that there is a bipartisan agenda in the US against China. So I think that for them it is a no-brainer. I don’t think we have the same approach in the EU,” said the senior EU official who spoke anonymously.
“I think US partners understand that we have no interest to single out any one part of the world, it doesn’t help anyone,” the official added.
US officials have seen things differently, with assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs Karen Donfried saying the council was a way to counter “the PRC’s vision for the rules of the road for the 21st century economy”.
“If you look at the working groups that we’ve created in the TTC, about half of them deal with different facets of these issues. So definitely that challenge posed by the PRC is something that we are very focused on,” she added.
The meeting comes at a moment of convergence on many elements of transatlantic foreign policy.
Emphasising the pace of change, Finnish leaders announced on Sunday that they would apply for Nato membership, pending parliamentary approval – a move that would have been unthinkable just months earlier.
Finland confirms country will apply to join Nato in historic shift
The war has also reinvigorated a transatlantic alliance that was marginalised during Donald Trump’s presidency. Now, both sides see it as the nerve centre of their joint action to counter Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The TTC has been an incubator for ideas around export controls and helped galvanise the giant punitive sanctioning of Russia, subsequently rolled out by the G7 and other allies.
Vestager said on Sunday that rather than being overshadowed by the war in Ukraine, issues with China were also “accelerating”, along with most geopolitical issues.
A summit between Beijing and Brussels in April, during which Chinese leaders failed to offer any indication that they would give up support for Russian President Vladimir Putin, helped harden European attitudes towards China.
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US officials have since floated with European counterparts the idea of using some of the tools designed to thwart Russia – sanctions, export controls, asset freezes – against China in the future.
“They see it as a dry run for China,” a second EU official told the Post last week. “But we’re not there yet.”
Nor on the immediate agenda is outbound investment screening, something the US has been pushing but which the EU also says is not an advanced discussion.
Carisa Nietsche, an analyst of transatlantic relations at the Centre for a New American Security, said that the EU would continue to “dance around” the wording, but that the undertones on China were clear.
“In large part, the US has not increased pressure on Europe to come along on China. Beijing has done the job for them,” she said, pointing to the backlash in Brussels to the April 1 summit.
“However, it’s likely the EU will veil measures to counter Beijing in actor-agnostic language that does not explicitly mention China.”
