European tour | Paris, Xi Jinping says he wants to work to resolve the crisis in Ukraine

Welcomed shortly after 4 p.m. (10 a.m. Eastern time) at Orly airport by Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, he will be received on Monday llyse by French President Emmanuel Macron, who intends to advocate commercial reciprocity and the search for a resolution to the war in Ukraine in the face of a leader Chinese who continue to show their support for Russia.

We hope that peace and stability will return quickly to Europe, and intend to work with France and the entire international community to find good avenues to resolve the crisis, writes the number one of the Asian superpower in an article published by the daily Le Figaro.

Paris, for its part, wants to ensure that China, the main ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, does not fall into clear support for his war effort against Kyiv. Even encourage it to use the levers it has over Moscow to contribute to a resolution of this conflict, according to the analysis.

Emmanuel Macron delivered this same message a year ago during his own state visit to China, with modest results.

After France, the Chinese president, returning for the first time to Europe since 2019, will visit Serbia and Hungary, two countries that have remained close to Moscow.

Commercial disputes

On Monday, Xi Jinping, who is coming to celebrate 60 years of Franco-Chinese diplomatic relations, will continue meetings with Emmanuel Macron, who met in advance with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

In the morning, the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen will join the French-Chinese duo Elyse for a session which should make it possible to raise trade disputes.

And they are many. Threatened to be caught between the American and Chinese economies, massively aided by public authorities, the European Union has in recent months increased investigations into Chinese state subsidies to several industrial sectors, particularly to electric vehicles, accused of distorting competition.

In an interview The gallery On Sunday, Emmanuel Macron recognizes that Europeans are not unanimous on the strategy to adopt because, he says, certain actors still see in China essentially a market of opportunities while it exports massively to Europe.

He pleads to better protect our national security, to be much more realistic in the defense of our interests and to obtain reciprocity.

Beijing, these measures considered protectionist go badly. The Chinese authorities have launched their own anti-subsidy investigation mainly targeting French cognac, against which the French president intends to protest.

Although no promising contract was announced at this stage, discussions on investments were ongoing until the end. A Franco-Chinese economic forum is planned for Monday at the Marigny Theater.

Xi Jinping assures in Le Figaro that the two countries are able to deepen their cooperation in terms of innovation to promote green development as is already the case with battery factories, hoping that France will offer its companies a fair and equitable business climate.

The doors close

In the afternoon, after a formal welcoming ceremony with great pomp at the Invalides, and before a banquet at the Lycée, Emmanuel Macron and Xi Jinping will meet face to face for the most political sequence, then will speak to the press.

The Frenchman intends to ask the Chinese to support the Olympic truce for all conflicts during the Paris Games this summer, including that in Ukraine.

The French president will drive the point home on Tuesday, in the Pyrenees, the occasion of a more personal getaway between the two men, accompanied by their wives.

The objective of this lunch on the Col du Tourmalet, where as a child he spent his holidays with his grandmother, is eminently diplomatic: to break the imposing protocol to establish a more direct dialogue, particularly on Ukraine.

On the sensitive issue of human rights, Emmanuel Macron says he prefers to discuss disagreements rather behind closed doors. Paris also did not want to prioritize the Tawan issue, even though it is at the heart of strong tensions between the United States and China.

Several thousand Tibetans, according to their representatives, gathered on Sunday in Paris to protest against the visit of the Chinese president to France, a country of human rights which welcomes a dictator.