European Council President Antonio Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen met with Xi on Thursday morning and Chinese Premier Li Qiang in the afternoon, China’s state broadcaster CCTV reported. The European leaders used the meetings to voice their concerns over a host of thorny issues, from the gaping trade imbalance between the two economies to China’s ongoing support for Russia in the Ukraine war, and – more recently – Beijing’s chokehold on the rare earths supply chain.
Von der Leyen told Xi that the EU’s economic ties with China – running at a trade deficit of 300 billion euros ($350 billion) last year – had reached “an inflection point.”
