[The tightening relationship between China and Italy has worried American officials, who have tried and failed to stop the deal, expressing concern that China’s economic expansion is a precursor to military and political ambitions. When it became clear that Italy would nevertheless sign the deal, the American ambassador in Italy and other officials instead tried to convince Italy not to use 5G wireless networks developed by the Chinese electronics giant Huawei, which Washington warns could be used by Beijing to spy on communications networks.]
By
Jason Horowitz
 |
|
President Xi Jinping of
China, left, and President Sergio Mattarella of Italy at
the Quirinale Palace in
Rome on Friday. Credit Alessandro Di Meo/
ANSA, via Associated
Press
|
ROME
— A cavalry escort usually
reserved for royals. A tour of the Coliseum and a visit to the ancient
Capitoline Hill. A performance by Andrea Bocelli in a presidential palace that
once housed popes.
The warm welcome President Xi Jinping of
China received in Rome on Friday was that of an exalted ally — or as critics
say, a conqueror — as he began a visit that will culminate on Saturday with the
signing of Italy’s official agreement to participate in China’s vast Belt and
Road infrastructure project.
In doing so, Italy will become the first
member of the Group of 7 nations that have long dominated the global economy to
take part in the project, a sign of how a rising China is reshaping the world’s
economic and geopolitical order.
“The ancient Silk Road was a tool of
knowledge among people and to share mutual discoveries,” President Sergio
Mattarella of Italy said Friday morning, standing next to Mr. Xi at the
Quirinal Palace. “The new one must also be a two-way street.”
Mr. Mattarella also urged the Chinese to help
protect the environment and show “respect for the rules of the market,”
something that many critics of China have said it flagrantly ignores.
Mr. Xi thanked Italy for its “deep
friendship” and spoke about the importance of “revitalizing the ancient Silk
Road,” strengthening ties and developing a “series of concrete projects”
together. He assured the Italians, who are desperate to open Chinese markets to
Italian goods, that he wanted a “commercial exchange that goes both ways and a
flow of investments that goes both ways.”
The tightening relationship between China and
Italy has worried American officials, who have tried and failed to stop the
deal, expressing concern that China’s economic expansion is a precursor to
military and political ambitions. When it became clear that Italy would
nevertheless sign the deal, the American ambassador in Italy and other
officials instead tried to convince Italy not to use 5G wireless networks
developed by the Chinese electronics giant Huawei, which Washington warns could
be used by Beijing to spy on communications networks.
Leaders of the European Union in Brussels
have also raised fears that Italy — saddled by debt, and tempted by promises of
hundreds of millions of euros in infrastructure investment — could fall prey to
a Chinese divide-and-conquer strategy. And critics of the Italian government
have called the deal yet another example of its dangerous naïveté and incompetence.
Even as Mr. Xi arrived in Italy on Thursday
night, Europe’s leaders, including Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte of Italy, met
in Brussels to strengthen transparency and reciprocity rules aimed directly at
China.
European leaders discussed their commitment
to increased “screening” of foreign, and especially Chinese, investments.
(Italy abstained from a recent vote to bolster that screening.) They discussed
new measures to address the advantages that Chinese state-backed companies have
in competing with private European firms and potential rules that would
introduce more reciprocity to trade with China, essentially closing European
markets to companies from countries that prevent European investment in their
markets.
“Since the beginning of my mandate I’ve been
calling for a real awareness and for the defense of European sovereignty,”
President Emmanuel Macron told reporters on Thursday, adding of the bloc’s more
aggressive position toward China, “I welcome this European awakening.”
After visiting Italy, Mr. Xi will visit
France on Tuesday, where he will meet Mr. Macron. But in a surprise
announcement on Friday, France revealed that Mr. Macron would be joined by
Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and Jean-Claude Juncker, the European
Commission’s president. Italy’s leaders were left out.
Italian leaders have argued that there is
nothing to be concerned about. Italy, they say, will avoid China’s debt traps,
and its laws prevent foreigners from taking control of its ports, as China has
done in Piraeus, Greece.
But critics of the government do not find
these guarantees reassuring.
A full page cartoon on the front page of
Thursday’s Il Foglio, a newspaper critical of the government, showed Mr. Conte,
the prime minister, leading an enormous, fire-breathing Chinese dragon with a
short leash and the nametag “Ping” — an allusion to a gaffe by Luigi Di Maio,
the leader of the Five Star Movement and the economic development minister. Mr.
Di Maio, who flew multiple times to China to strike the deal, once mistakenly
called Mr. Xi “President Ping.”
In the cartoon, Mr. Conte says, “Take it easy
guys, I can manage him. He practically eats from my hand.”
Mr. Conte, who will meet with Mr. Xi
tomorrow, has defended the deal, saying it was a way to inject Italian goods
into a huge Asian market.
“We want to first and foremost rebalance our
trade, which is not favorable to us now. Our exports to China are far lower
than other European countries’,” Mr. Conte told Italy’s Parliament before the
visit. “We will have new airports, new trade corridors, and it will certainly
influence our economic growth. We don’t want to lose any opportunity.”
China also doesn’t want to lose the
opportunity to make use of Italy’s ports, through which it could transport
goods from the East or resources from its vast investments in Africa. The port
of Trieste, on Italy’s northern Adriatic border, for example, has attracted
China with its deep harbors, advantageous customs rules and connection to a
railroad network that leads directly into Central Europe.
“China is interested in ports,” said Michele
Geraci, Italy’s under secretary in the economic development ministry and the
government’s key negotiator on the agreement. “And we are interested in China
helping us grow the size of that port.”
Mr. Geraci, who lived in China for a decade,
also emphasized the importance of Mr. Xi’s visit on Friday to the Italian
official’s hometown, Palermo, Sicily. It is another key port, especially for
goods coming from Africa, he said. But he has also suggested the visit could be
a boon for tourism, as the mere presence of Mr. Xi indicates to hundreds of
millions of Chinese citizens that Italy is worth the trip.
“It’s a positive thing,” said former Prime
Minister Romano Prodi, who has deep experience with China and who said Germany,
France and other European nations already conducted much more business with
China. “It’s a competition between the countries of Europe.”
But by entering the Chinese playing field,
Italy is potentially drifting away from the United States. The Trump administration,
according to Italian officials, did not argue against the deal until it was in
very late stages. American critics of China’s government said the failure to
prioritize the China deal amounted to diplomatic malpractice.
On Friday morning, Mr. Xi and his delegation
met with their Italian counterparts at the Quirinal Palace. Mr. Mattarella’s
most pointed public remark was a passing reference to “the European-Chinese
dialogue on human rights,” a nod to Europe’s criticism of China’s crackdown on religious
and ethnic minorities, including millions of ethnic Uighur Muslims.
Mr. Xi showed no reaction to the remark.
“Looking at the world, we are facing an epochal change, and China and Italy are
two important forces in the world to safeguard peace and promote development,”
Mr. Xi said at the palace. “China wants to work with Italy,” he said, calling
on both countries to “intensify their political trust.”
