BEIJING, July 28 (Reuters) – China’s No.2 leader, Premier Li Qiang, visited the city of Tangshan on Tuesday for the 50th anniversary of a 1976 earthquake that killed a quarter of a million people – a trip usually made by Chinese presidents. Li paid his respects on President Xi Jinping’s behalf, state media said, while…
BEIJING, July 28 (Reuters) – Chinese President Xi Jinping hopes Slovakia will play a constructive role in the development of European Union’s relations with China, focusing on properly handling conflicts and differences, according to a report on Tuesday from state news agency Xinhua. The key is to engage in equal consultation and seek common ground…
The European Union has sanctioned two mainland Chinese oil refineries and one Hong Kong-based oil trader as part of its latest efforts to hobble Russia’s war economy, drawing a stern rebuke from Beijing. The companies were listed in a broader package of sanctions agreed by the EU’s 27 member states on Thursday morning, punishing in…
European Union leaders still want to collaborate with the United States on China policy – even as Washington’s envoys continue to slam the bloc’s digital laws. The dynamic played out at a forum in Brussels on Tuesday, where American diplomats bashed Europe’s green, digital and economic policies, insisting that the EU would need to change…
“Scrambling fighter jets is NATO’s job,” said a senior EU official. The EU’s “job is to be ready to be in the position we need to be when we have to respond — to enhance our readiness and have the tools to be able to react to threats when needed, reinforcing common tools and capabilities…
By John Irish UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -Slovakia on Wednesday pushed back on pressure it is facing to cut back its purchases of Russian energy, saying it was ready to discuss the issue, but singled out some European states for increasing their gas purchases from Moscow. Populist-led Slovakia and Hungary – both EU members – have…
The president is pressuring NATO allies to stop purchasing oil from Russia, saying if they continue to do so, he’ll enact sanctions alongside them. Currently Turkey, Hungary, and Slovakia buy Russian oil, and others purchase Russian natural gas. Russia uses the profits to wage war in Ukraine. Now President Trump says NATO should also. Tariffs…
President Donald Trump challenged members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) on Saturday to fully remove themselves from Russian oil before he agreed to further sanctions on Moscow, raising the question as to why some member states still use Russian oil years into the invasion of Ukraine. Newsweek reached out to NATO and the…
A recent discussion paper floated by the Danish presidency of the Council of the EU, seen by POLITICO, explored whether capitals would be open to imposing tariffs on Moscow as part of the bloc’s 19th sanctions package. That idea, according to several diplomats briefed on the talks, won little traction among ministers when it was…
If Brussels bureaucrats returning from their long summer breaks this week were wondering what they missed, the local press had them covered. Unbecoming scenes at June’s Nato summit, the “hopelessly one-sided” trade deal with the United States in July, as well as President Xi Jinping’s refusal to travel to Belgium for that month’s summit with…