The giant Cosco settles in the strategic infrastructure
The German Council of Ministers, on behalf of Chancellor, Social Democrat Olaf Scholz, approved on Wednesday the controversial sale to the Chinese consortium Cosco of a significant, albeit limited, stake in the port of Hamburg, the largest in the country. Despite the reluctance of the green and liberal government partners, warnings from Brussels and the president of Germany himself, Frank Walter Steinmeier, the Chinese group will have a 24.9% stake in the smallest of the four major docks of the aforementioned container unloading port. . Cosco sought a 35% stake, which was reduced at the request of the German government after difficult negotiations between Social Democrats, Greens and Liberals. The chancellor himself, who will soon be making an official visit to China, defended the sale to the Chinese shipowner and eventually imposed the operation on his partners in the executive branch.
As many as six federal ministries had previously discouraged the sale because of the impact China could have on what is considered strategic infrastructure. Countless politicians in Berlin and Brussels, but also Steinmeier, remembered what dependence on a dictatorial country leads to, as in the case of gas and Russia. However, the agreement negotiated within the executive branch considers several clauses that significantly limit the maneuvering area of the Chinese maritime giant. Cosco may not have “contractual veto power over strategic business or personnel decisions” and is prohibited from appointing “executive team members.” Federal Economy Minister, the green Robert Habeck, had warned that Germany cannot create new dependencies on third countries with non-democratic regimes if it sweats the last straw to lose Russia and its energy supply.
“For the future, we must take into account the lessons learned and reduce unilateral dependencies where possible, especially with China,” the German head of state had said last night. In view of Russia’s invasive war in Ukraine, he stressed that there is no certainty that an economic exchange will lead to political rapprochement. The confidence that had been placed in the exchange policy through trade has disappeared, Steinmeier said. The leader of the conservative opposition, Friedrich Merz, also sharply criticized Scholz. “I don’t understand how the Chancellor can insist on making progress in such a situation,” said Merz, for whom “the priority should not be the financial aspects of the operation, but the political-strategic ones.”
Numerous experts have warned of the growing power of the Chinese group Cosco in Europe, where it already participates in many ports of a strategic nature for the continent. In Greece, it controls 100% of the important port of Piraeus, but also 40% of the port of Bilbao and more than 50% of the port of Valencia, and has significant interests in other major continental docks such as Zeebrugge or Antwerp in Belgium.
Source: La Verdad
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