PM in China

During his visit to China, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez told President Xi Jinping that Spain supports the proposals for peace made by Volodymyr Zelensky and encouraged him to speak with the Ukrainian president. While in Beijing, Sr Sánchez also met with Chinese PM Li Qiang and the president of the National People’s Assembly, Zhao Leji. He highlighted how much the world has changed during the 50 years since Spain and China established diplomatic relations, and said the talks had been very useful to reestablish relations after the pandemic.

Both countries adopted various agreements, and laid the foundations for greater cooperation, including reestablishment of high-level dialogues established in 2018, reinforcement of economic and commercial cooperation, and relaunching the mixed committee for economic and industrial cooperation.

Deals were reached on exporting Spanish almonds, groups of Chinese tourists being allowed to visit Spain and opening a Cervantes culture centre in Shanghai. Since Spain will assume the presidency of the EU in July, the PM called on China to cooperate, especially on global challenges like climate change, multilateralism and growing inequality, noting it was ‘very positive’ the EU and China have relaunched talks on human rights. Sr Sánchez also expressed the need for greater balance in economic and commercial relations, respect for rules, greater transparency and reciprocity in access to markets.

Regarding Russia’s ‘illegal war against Ukraine’, he said a ‘fair and lasting peace’ would have to respect the UN Charter and the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the invaded country.