Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday committed to strengthening relations with the EU following a meeting with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez in Beijing.
“Let us establish a stronger bond between China and the European Union,” Xi said at the Great Hall of the People. “If these powers understand each other and cooperate, it will benefit their societies and also contribute to the stability, peace, and prosperity of the world in this delicate international climate.”
Xi also recognized Sánchez as a key interlocutor between Beijing and Brussels, and said that, amid complicated global relations, Spain and China had worked to forge close ties that were “contributing to the stability” of his country’s broader relationship with the EU.
In an apparent swipe at U.S. President Donald Trump, who has clashed with Sánchez over his refusal to back Washington’s foreign policy and the ongoing war in the Middle East, the Chinese president praised Spain for being a country that acts “with moral rectitude.”
He added that both Madrid and Beijing were “on the right side of history” and committed to work with the Spanish prime minister to “reject the world’s return to the law of the jungle” and “jointly defend genuine multilateralism.”
The meeting between Xi and Sánchez took place prior to a state banquet honoring the Spanish leader, who is on his fourth visit to Beijing in as many years. The premier has long advocated for stronger ties with China and doubled down on those calls following Trump’s reelection, insisting the EU must look for other global partners as the transatlantic relationship appears to deteriorate.
Those moves have not gone unnoticed in Washington. Following Sánchez’s trip to Beijing last year, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Spain’s attempts to forge closer trade relations with China were akin to “cutting your own throat.”
The Spanish premier doesn’t appear to have been swayed by the Trump administration’s warnings. He again defended on Tuesday a “EU-China relationship based on trust, dialogue, and stability” and the ultimate goal of a “multipolar order built from respect and pragmatism.”
Brussels is increasingly backing Sánchez’s strategy. At POLITICO’s European Pulse Forum in Barcelona last week, European Commission Vice President and Industrial Strategy Commissioner Stéphane Séjourné said the EU needed Chinese investment and counseled against following the U.S.’s isolationist stance toward Beijing.
“It’s a good thing to talk and to keep discussing with China,” he added.
