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GOOD MORNING. This is Stuart Lau, POLITICO’s EU-China correspondent. Jakob will be back with us tomorrow, but in the meantime, I’m writing today’s Playbook on the absolutely speedy and comfy Brussels-Luxembourg super-express train to cover the EU Foreign Affairs Council, beginning this morning. Come say hi if you’re around.
LIFE-CHANGING PARTY: China’s Communist Party congress, which happens every five years, continues today through the rest of the week after President Xi Jinping kicked things off Sunday. The event will culminate in Xi breaking with convention as he is expected to assume leadership for a third term. Xi used his first congress speech as he amasses unchallenged power to double down on the possible military option of taking over Taiwan, reshaping the global order in the Chinese way, while dropping no hint whatsoever about putting an end to China’s draconian measures in the name of “zero COVID.”
EU begins a rethink: Thousands of miles away in Luxembourg, the EU’s 27 national foreign ministers will today discuss the very topic of China. It’s been a long hiatus since the last such discussion, thanks of course to Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Economic competition and systemic rivalry with China are now taking center stage, even though the need for cooperation on certain matters still exists, according to an internal paper prepared by the European External Action Service (the EU’s foreign affairs branch) and sent to the bloc’s 27 member countries.
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Challenge, challenge, challenge: “The EU should … identify and address the challenges deriving from China’s foreign policy,” notes the EEAS paper, obtained by POLITICO’s Jacopo Barigazzi. “China’s activities and positions in multilateral organisations exemplify its determination to systematically promote an alternative vision of the world order.”
The key is to refocus: The EU appears to be edging closer to a rethink of whether the “partner-competitor-rival” formula for China still works today. Wouldn’t it make more sense, some China-skeptic diplomats ask, to make it “competitor-rival-partner” instead? “Whilst the current EU strategy is still valid, China has become an even stronger global competitor for the EU, the U.S. and other like-minded partners,” the EEAS paper states.
A senior EU diplomat, explaining the current thinking, said: “Since we defined it [in 2019], it’s obvious that the third part of the story [“systemic rivalry”] has gained some momentum. This is not a moment to change the policy. This is a moment to assess where we are, and how and whether our policy is the correct one … Maybe in the future, there will be a need [to change it].”
DO NOT BE FOOLED: The EEAS also reminds member countries not to read too much into what appears to be Beijing’s efforts to distance itself from the Russian war: “Although more recently China seems to have distanced itself slightly from Russia’s objectives in Ukraine especially when Putin threatened the use of nuclear weapons, China-Russia bilateral relations clearly amount to a strong strategic partnership, based on support for each other’s core interests, and cannot be ignored.”
EU ON TAIWAN MESSAGING: The other elephant in the room is Taiwan. The EU will call on member countries to consider sending stronger messages — and economic warnings — to Beijing as it steps up military threats against Taiwan. “It is key to focus on de-escalation and dissuasion to prevent the erosion of the status quo, including by referring to possible consequences in case of specific unilaterally imposed changes to the status quo,” the paper states.
Unity, while it lasts: EU countries, the EEAS argues, “should prevent and isolate China’s attempts to apply its divide et impera tactics.” All sounds well — except the biggest economy in the bloc wasn’t entirely convinced …
In less than three weeks: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz will travel to China to likely be the first Western leader to congratulate Xi on his reappointment as leader in person. He will be flanked by a delegation of business representatives — a departure from his message just a few months ago while on a visit to Japan when he said German companies should diversify and not just focus on China.
More talks to follow: The European Council summit later this week will also touch upon “EU-Asia relations.” An eagle-eyed EU diplomat told me that the draft conclusions do not directly spell out the three pillars expressly, while “encouraging” Beijing to assume “greater responsibility” and to take “more ambitious action on climate.”
EXPLOSIONS IN KYIV: Multiple explosions were reported in Kyiv this morning, just a week after Russian missile strikes on the Ukrainian capital. The BBC has more.
MUSK COMES AROUND … SORT OF: The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, reluctantly agreed to continue funding the use of his Starlink satellite internet service in Ukraine, despite earlier warnings asking the Pentagon to pay for the crucial system for frontline Ukrainian soldiers to launch successful counteroffensives against Russia.
Tweet of the weekend: “The hell with it … even though Starlink is still losing money & other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we’ll just keep funding Ukraine govt for free,” Musk tweeted Saturday.
Should we be worried … that so much of Ukraine’s security guarantee actually relies on a single individual — and somebody who happens to like to talk to Vladimir Putin on the phone and hammered out a half-baked, so-called peace plan on Twitter?
SANCTIONS FOR RUSSIA, ROUND 9 … Also in Luxembourg today, the Polish and Baltic foreign ministers are expected to start preparations for a fresh round of sanctions. The details were scarce as of Sunday, with loose suggestions ranging from further import/export bans to hitting the banking sector.
New attacks mean new sanctions: Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Reinsalu told Playbook the new sanctions would be necessary given Putin isn’t stopping the war: “The leaders and the populations in different countries are getting from the media and getting from Ukraine all the events on the ground, all the escalating steps of Russia, [which] will make a difference. And therefore, I would presume that now again, unfortunately, these new sanctions package proposals are also written in that context.”
… AND IRAN: Ministers are also expected to approve sanctions over the crackdown on women’s rights protesters in Iran. Refresher here.
CALL FOR TRIBUNAL: Reinsalu also joined forces with his Lithuanian and Latvian counterparts on Sunday, issuing a call for the EU to back a new special tribunal to (effectively) try Putin. “Currently there is no international court or tribunal that could bring Russia’s top political and military leadership to account for committing the crime of aggression against Ukraine. The Special Tribunal for the Punishment of the Crime of Aggression against Ukraine has to be established to fill this jurisdictional loophole. The EU together with our partners must be at the center of this effort,” the trio said.
TRAINING MISSION: On a less contentious matter, the 27 foreign ministers are expected to OK a brand new EU-led training mission for Ukrainians. More details from Jacopo. The EU also greenlit an additional €500 million to reimburse members’ arms donations.
WHICH GENIUS CAME UP WITH NORD STREAM, THE GREENS ASK: The German Greens, a junior member of Chancellor Scholz’s ruling three-party coalition, voted on Saturday in favor of setting up a parliamentary committee to investigate why German politicians pursued the Nord Stream 2 pipeline despite warnings, and how Europe’s biggest economy allowed itself to become so reliant on Russian gas.
Bundestag split: The motion, adopted at the Greens’ party congress, tasks the party’s parliamentary group with setting up such an investigative committee. There’s still a big hurdle, though: Scholz’s Social Democrats as well as the main opposition party, the center-right Christian Democratic Union, have less incentive to provide the votes necessary for installing such a committee because top politicians from both parties (including Scholz) were among the top promoters of Nord Stream 2 under previous administrations.
HOW PUTIN MAIMED GAZPROM: Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has created an unexpected victim — Gazprom. The Russian gas export monopoly has seen its share of the European market shrivel from 40 percent to only 9 percent while its two Nord Stream pipelines built at a cost of over €20 billion lie holed on the bottom of the Baltic. Meanwhile, its share price is down 88 percent since the February invasion and the company in August was spotted flaring large quantities of unsold gas. Victor Jack has more.
NOW READ THIS: Lili Bayer explains what the world would look like if Putin loses power, and it’s not pretty: A Shakespearean knife-fight for power; unleashed regional leaders; a nuclear arsenal up for grabs — all are possible outcomes. Read her story here.
NOT A FAN OF KEEPING RECEIPTS? MEP COULD BE YOUR DREAM JOB: The European Parliament’s top brass are expected to vote on a new rule today whereby MEPs would no longer need to keep receipts to justify their expenses. Sounds much easier — except there’s public money involved. Green MEP Daniel Freund, who sits on the budgetary control committee, thinks it’s a terrible idea.
‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ is the rule so far: “On paper, right now, MEPs should keep receipts, and they should only spend on certain things. But no one has ever been checking this. It’s just money that gets wired to the MEPs,” Freund told Playbook. “On paper, they should also give the unused money back. But we repeatedly asked the Parliament administration to tell us and, you know, no one is ever giving this money back.”
€€€: The so-called general expenditure allowance amounts to €4,778 per month. This rounds up to about €40 million a year. According to Freund, the Parliament Bureau’s Green representative, Vice-President Heidi Hautala, submitted a proposal recently, suggesting only €1,500 of that monthly sum could continue to go unchecked. But it failed to win any support.
Others say it’s not cost-effective: Playbook made an inquiry with Parliament’s press services, and they said extra scrutiny of this sort would involve up to 70 additional staff members for administrative procedures. “It’s not about relaxing the rules, it’s about improving transparency and accountability,” a spokesperson said, adding that there would be a voluntary system for MEPs to disclose their expenses, and a new system to allow MEPs to claim less than the lump sum if they so wish.
FRONTEX BUDGET: The Parliament is meanwhile keeping a close eye on the spending of an outside party this week: Frontex. MEPs will vote on the discharge of the 2020 — yes, you read that right — budget for the EU border agency. The debate comes days after a much-anticipated report by the EU’s anti-fraud watchdog OLAF was made public and concluded that Frontex employees were involved in the cover-up of illegal pushbacks of migrants from Greece to Turkey, violating their fundamental rights, our Athens-based colleague Nektaria Stamouli reports.
Harrowing account: The 120-page report says Frontex committed “serious misconduct and other irregularities” in covering up pushback incidents, not investigating them or handling them correctly. In one case, the report said a Frontex surveillance plane flew away from the scene of an alleged pushback “to avoid witnessing incidents in the Aegean Sea.”
Don’t turn a blind eye: The Parliament’s Left group will ask during the debate for “Council and Commission statements on Frontex’s responsibility for fundamental rights violations at the EU’s external borders in light of the OLAF report.”
“The European Parliament should absolutely not grant Frontex budgetary discharge until these problems are addressed and solved, including actions and responsibilities of the board as well,” said Left MEP Malin Björk.
DOZENS RESCUED AT GREEK-TURKISH BORDERS: In the meantime, horrendous violence continues at the Greek-Turkish borders. Greek authorities said Saturday they had rescued dozens of migrants, who were stranded completely naked, with injuries all over their bodies, at the land borders.
RENEW’S GOT A SCANDI PROBLEM: The incoming Swedish government, made up of center-right and liberal parties, is now leaning on support from the far right. This puts the Renew Europe grouping in an awkward position of keeping a close eye on one of its member parties potentially working with a group with which it doesn’t usually align.
Difficult balance: Stéphane Séjourné, who leads Renew Europe in Parliament, will meet members Tuesday to discuss the way forward: “I acknowledge that the Swedish Liberals blocked the far right from entering the government. But I regret the agreement and the direction it is taking. There are always other options: from a pro-European government to new elections. A government with the far right cannot have our blessing.”
BORRELL RAISES EYEBROWS WITH ‘GARDEN’ METAPHOR: Top EU diplomat Josep Borrell raised eyebrows last week with a metaphor about tending to Europe’s “garden” while the rest of the world remains a “jungle.”
Officiating the opening of the European Diplomatic Academy at the College of Europe, Borrell tried to convey to students how important it is to keep Europe safe and sound. But his rhetoric felt a bit, well, colonial for many critics.
Garden vs jungle: “Europe is a garden,” said the off-script Borrell, before turning to his predecessor, the academy’s chief Federica Mogherini, to say: “And the rest of the world — as you know very well, Federica — is not exactly a garden … Most of the rest of the world is a jungle. And the jungle could invade the garden, and the gardeners should take care of it.” The gardeners — he said, likely including himself — “have to go to the jungle.” The full speech is online.
Criticism: “Historically, in recent centuries at least, it’s been the ‘garden’ invading/imperialising/colonizing the ‘jungle,’” said Mohamad Forough, a scholar whose Twitter commentary made Borrell’s remarks go viral. “Diplomatically, this is an extremely offensive analogy because it dissuades countries in the global south (‘the jungle’) to stand with us in Europe against brutal aggressors such as Putin and the war he has waged on innocent Ukrainians.”
Few are impressed: Former Canadian Ambassador to the U.N. Bob Rae retweeted Borrell’s comments, adding: “What a terrible analogy Mr Borrell has made. Surely history and our own lived experience teaches us that no part of the world is free from violence.” Jannes Tessmann, head of the Mercator Stiftung’s Istanbul office, described his remarks as “supremacist glory.”
Not even his own people: Playbook spoke to a half-amused and half-disappointed EU diplomat, who said of Borrell: “He’d just given a speech to ambassadors telling them to be empathetic and less condescending and then gives a speech to the ‘European Diplomatic Academy’ where he says this.”
TIME’S UP FOR TRUSS? In six short weeks as British prime minister, Liz Truss has succeeded in angering all wings of her Conservative Party. Most now agree she can’t fight the next election, according to my colleagues Eleni Courea and Esther Webber. “I’ve never known the atmosphere to be as febrile as it is at the moment,” one veteran Tory MP who backed Truss in the leadership contest said. Another MP who supported her said: “It feels like the end. I think she’ll be gone [this] week.” Are you ready for a third British PM in two months? More details here.
Meanwhile, Truss’ new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, brought in to save her floundering premiership and calm spooked markets, is signaling he could junk more of her economic plan. Annabelle Dickson and Matt Honeycombe-Foster have the story.
ROMAN INFIGHTING: The row between the two flagbearers in the Italian ring wing is intensifying. Ex-PM Silvio Berlusconi appeared to describe the likely next prime minister and his supposed ally Giorgia Meloni as “patronizing, bossy, arrogant and offensive” in a note photographed by the press. The note added: “No willingness to change, she is one with which you cannot get along.” Meloni’s response? “An adjective is missing: I am not-blackmailable.”
For now the other ring-wing heavyweight, Matteo Salvini, is on Meloni’s side: “I warned him [Berlusconi], ‘Look, Giorgia has the numbers, you can’t get in the way.’” Karl Mathiesen has the write-up.
GERMAN FIGHTING WORDS: German Chancellor Scholz lashed out at Poland and Hungary over the weekend at European Socialists’ party congress in Berlin, Hans von der Burchard reports: “When there is talk of illiberal democracy in the middle of Europe, it must worry us very much. That is why we cannot accept it when principles of the rule of law are violated and democratic control is dismantled,” Scholz said.
SCOOP — MEET THE GIG WORKER BILL HARDLINERS: POLITICO tech reporter Pieter Haeck got this scoop for you this morning: Eight EU countries are now seeking to tighten the screws around the bloc’s plans for a Platform Work Bill, which is aimed at requiring companies like Uber to treat their “gig workers” just like full employees.
What’s the debate? The Commission in December introduced five criteria to determine if gig workers are controlled like employees by platforms. The Czech presidency of the Council of the EU made some tweaks, raising the bar for reclassification by introducing exemptions or increasing the number of criteria to trigger such a presumption (from two to three).
In the dissidents’ letter: “An effective and strong, but rebuttable, legal presumption of the employment relationship, reflecting the actual control and direction exercised by digital labour platforms, must remain the core of the Directive,” the labor ministers of Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain write. Exemptions, they add, “would only perpetuate the existing imbalance” between platforms and gig workers. More details for POLITICO Pro Morning Tech subscribers.
— Meeting of the EU’s Foreign Affairs Council with top EU diplomat Josep Borrell in attendance, 9:30 a.m. in Luxembourg.
— Meeting of the EU Agriculture and Fisheries Council, 10 a.m. in Luxembourg.
— Commissioner Thierry Breton meets Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and other national ministers in Budapest.
— European Parliament plenary session kicks off. European Parliament President Roberta Metsola will make a statement at the start, marking five years since the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, 5:00 p.m in Strasbourg.
— European Parliament President Roberta Metsola will also meet the Prosecutor General of Ukraine Andriy Kostin and separately European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
— Meeting of the European Parliament’s Bureau.
BIRTHDAYS: MEP Hannes Heide; Former MEP Cecilia Wikström; Simon Harris, Ireland’s higher education minister and POLITICO 28 alum; Former Spanish Social Affairs Minister Pablo Iglesias Turrión; Journalism Trust Initiative’s Bertrand Mossiat.
MANY THANKS: To reporters Jacopo Barigazzi, Hans von der Burchard, Nektaria Stamouli, Suzanne Lynch, Jakob Hanke Vela, Pieter Haeck, editor Emma Anderson and our producer Grace Stranger.
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