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This month, the South China Morning Post’s Xiaofei Xu sat down with Deng Li, China’s ambassador to France. The conversation was wide-ranging enough to warrant a two-part story. Here is part one, covering China’s European diplomacy. China would like to see France lead Europe to become a truly independent power to help build a stable multipolar world, Beijing’s top diplomat to France told the South China Morning Post in an exclusive interview. Striking a positive tone on relations between Beijing and Paris despite mounting challenges, Deng Li, China’s ambassador to France, said Europe should not only be an economic and cultural power but also a political force contributing to global peace and stability. And France, as the European Union nation with the strongest tradition of independence and autonomy, should play a leading role in guiding Europe to that goal, he said. Deng’s remarks came amid what Beijing described as a “once-in-a-century” shift in the global landscape that created risks and uncertainties, further complicated by the volatility of United States policies after the change of administration in January. “If you want the world to be stable, then you should follow what our President Xi Jinping calls an ‘equal and orderly multipolar world’ and ‘universally beneficial and inclusive economic globalisation’. I think Europe is now facing a choice in this regard,” Deng said. “I’ve told the French that, just like this table, it needs at least three legs to be stable,” Deng said. “If Europe has this ambition, it should be able to [become a leg], but whether Europe wants to is a question that only they can answer.” Deng argued that the 27-member bloc’s designation of China as a “partner, competitor and systemic rival”, coined in 2019, sent confusing messages and should not be a guiding policy in bilateral relations. He said that in most bilateral relationships, all three aspects were present – only in varying degrees – with each relationship involving elements of cooperation, competition and differing views or interests. “That is normal, but it shouldn’t become the basis of policy. A policy must have a clear main direction,” he said, adding that China hoped to see Europe choose partnership as the main direction for relations between Beijing and Brussels. Deng reiterated remarks by Wang Yi in March last year in which China’s foreign minister said the EU’s current triple positioning on China was akin to an intersection having the red, green and yellow traffic lights all on at the same time. “How can you drive the car in that situation? It’s simply unworkable,” Deng said. A key obstacle, if not the biggest one, in China’s relationship with France and more broadly with Europe, was Beijing’s strategic ties with Moscow as the Ukraine crisis broke out. European countries have repeatedly urged China to exert its influence to end it. But for Deng, this kind of thinking missed the point. He said China had always called for a peaceful solution through dialogue and diplomacy, but Beijing did not hold the key. “I understand Europe’s concerns about its own security. But how to ultimately view and approach this issue is truly a matter for Europe itself – it’s something Europe needs to think through on its own,” he said. “To put it more plainly – is what both sides want really something that China possesses? Then why say it as if only China can solve it? If China did hold what both sides are seeking, then yes, the leverage point would be with China – but it does not.” From China’s perspective, the negotiations have three layers: the Russo-Ukrainian layer, the Russo-European layer and finally the Russo-American layer, none of which China is a direct party to, Deng said. Earlier this month, when French President Emmanuel Macron’s diplomacy adviser Emmanuel Bonne met Wang in Hangzhou, Bonne called on Chinese authorities to end direct or indirect contributions made by Chinese entities to Russia’s military industry, according to a statement published by the French embassy in China. Europe and the US have long accused China of selling drone parts and “dual-use” technologies to Russia in support of Moscow, an allegation China has repeatedly denied. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent this month threatened to release photos from the Ukrainian government showing that Chinese parts were present in shot down Russian drones. For Deng, such accusations disregard China’s dominance in civilian drone supply chains. More than 70 per cent of the world’s drones or drone components are made in China, making it difficult to ban its exports. “This isn’t really an issue of whether China exports them or not – you can find Chinese-made civilian drones almost anywhere in the world,” he said. Deng stressed that China strictly prohibited the export of military drones and regulated the export of dual-use drones. “But civilian drones are everywhere. In China, civilian drones are as common as household appliances,” he said. “They’re not some kind of hi-tech or sophisticated equipment. Every travel blogger on Douyin or RedNote has one.” For now, China would keep communicating its position to the French side and hope that, with time, they understood it, Deng said. He said there was another message China would continue to communicate to France while anticipating greater understanding over time: that China would never seek global hegemony. “When we said this, many people did not get it. We’ve been trying hard to explain, but if they really cannot grasp it, then they can observe, take their time and see for themselves,” Deng said. He said a Eurocentric world view and Western belief drawn from the history of international relations that “a strong nation must dominate” made it difficult for many in Europe to believe China’s message. “For hundreds of years, whenever a country’s economy grew stronger, it would start expanding and waging wars against its neighbours. They use this logic to assume that since China is developing, it must also be seeking hegemony,” he said. China, which has historically been an inward-looking nation, had a different history and cultural background from the West, he said, adding that the Great Wall had been built for defence, not for aggression. Deng said that as China continued to rise and pursue national rejuvenation, a long-term goal of being a prosperous, strong and culturally vibrant nation, those who might not understand his country’s intentions could observe for themselves whether it was following a peaceful path or repeating the expansionist behaviour of past Western powers. “What’s certain is that China will never respond to a trade deficit by sending opium to another country to sell,” Deng said, pointing to Britain’s actions in the 19th century. China’s defeat at the hands of Britain in the opium wars was followed by decades of coercive treaties, territorial concessions and foreign domination by various Western powers and Japan, in an era known in China as a “century of humiliation”. China and EU relations are strained over huge trade deficits and mutual accusations of unfair trade practices. In July, China announced definitive anti-dumping duties of up to 34.9 per cent on EU brandy for five years, but offered exemptions to most major producers. The move, along with a similar investigation into EU pork and dairy products, is widely seen as a retaliatory measure against the EU’s heavy tariff imposed on Chinese-produced electric vehicles. Despite the challenges, Deng believed that relations between Beijing and Paris were still advancing. Both sides should try to keep cooperating while managing their differences. The two countries must enhance communication on major international issues to understand each other’s positions and foster greater stability in the world by cooperating where common interests aligned, Deng said. He said there were no major obstacles to a potential state visit by Macron to China and that both sides were working together to find an appropriate time that fit both their schedules. “We hope to achieve shared development amid this new technological revolution, and we also wish to work together to address global challenges.”
