Category: Europe

The European Commission's Global Gateway initiative will turn three years old in December. The $300 billion infrastructure initiative was launched with great fanfare to provide developing countries in Africa and elsewhere with an alternative to China's Belt and Road Initiative.

Belarus, which has been hit by Western sanctions over its support for Russia's offensive in Ukraine, said Thursday it will sign a free trade deal with China for services and investment. China's Prime Minister Li Qiang was in Belarus to meet ...

Europe is Africa's largest trading partner and its largest source of foreign direct investment. But a lot of that economic engagement is powered by inertia, left over from Europe's long, painful history of colonial exploitation in Africa.

China's electric vehicle giant BYD on Monday signed a one-billion-dollar agreement with Turkey to open a plant in the country in a move that would help it dodge new EU tariffs. The signing ceremony in Istanbul between BYD's CEO Wang Chuanfu ...

By James Edgar Chinese President Xi Jinping told Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Monday that world powers should help Russia and Ukraine re-start direct negotiations during a visit to Beijing branded a "peace mission" by the European leader.

By Lukas Fiala When Ursula von der Leyen took on the top job in Brussels back in 2019, she vowed to transform the European Union’s quasi-government—the European Commission—into a “geopolitical Commission.” Little did EU bureaucrats ...

China's Eurasia envoy has wrapped up a third round of shuttle diplomacy over the war in Ukraine, Beijing said Friday, as it seeks to position itself as a mediator in the conflict. China, which claims to be a neutral party in ...

Thinking about Africa in the context of the climate crisis makes for some cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, the continent’s massive potential for renewable energy, its stocks of critical minerals, and its storehouses of oil, gas, and coal make it a huge “ka-ching” in continental form. ...

By Alvaro Mendez and Chris Alden The negotiations for the EU-Mercosur Free Trade Agreement (FTA) have spanned over two decades and are now facing renewed delays. This prolonged process is a crucial moment in Latin America's trade policy, especially as Brazilian ...

By Lukas Fiala, Hugo Jones, and Chris Alden Russia’s steadily escalating war in Ukraine has shocked Europe’s post-Cold War security order to its core.  Over the past week, we saw China’s party-state kicking into gear as ambassadors and spokespersons increasingly

The European Union is putting pressure on Ghana to tackle illegal fishing in its waters, threatening its access to the lucrative European seafood market. In 2021, the EU issued a so-called yellow card, saying that if Ghana doesn’t improve fisheries management, it could face seafood-related sanctions.

Africa, the Korean peninsula, and multilateralism are no longer prominent themes in the Foreign Minister's annual press briefing on the sidelines of the Two Sessions forum in Beijing.  The Chinese state-run media outlet CGTN produced a visualization of the topics addressed ...