BEIJING – Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is visiting China in an effort to boost cooperation with the world's second-largest economy and boost trade ties, she said on Tuesday during a visit aimed at improving relations between the two countries after Italy withdrew. from the “One Generation One Road” initiative.
Ms Meloni, who is making her first visit to China as prime minister, said the eurozone's third-largest economy wanted to balance its relationship with Beijing.
“Today, Italian investment in China is about three times greater than Chinese investment in Italy,” Prime Minister Meloni told reporters. “Obviously, we want to work to remove barriers so that our products can access the Chinese market.”
Asked what her far-right government, which she leads from 2022, hopes to achieve from the visit, Ms Meloni said Italy is seeking to “strengthen our cooperation with the aim of balancing trade.”
Italy is a country of strategic importance to China.
Italy could serve as a moderate voice within the European Union as the bloc's 27 member states consider whether to back the Commission's proposal to impose tariffs on Chinese electric cars.
EU member states will vote in October on whether to apply additional tariffs to Chinese electric cars. Italy is one of the countries that has given signs that it will support this measure.
In 2019, Italy became the only member of the G7, the group of industrialized democracies, to join President Xi's One Belt One Road infrastructure initiative, modeled on the ancient Silk Road trade route, by marked a diplomatic victory for China.
Although Rome withdrew from the program last year under pressure from the United States, Italian officials have continued to signal that they still want to develop trade relations with the $18.6 trillion economy.
Balanced trade and investment
Asked whether she had specifically discussed with Mr Xi about Chinese car makers opening factories in Italy during Monday's meeting, Ms Meloni said no, but added: “The issue of electric cars is one of the issues included in the cooperation agreement industrial.”
Ms Meloni told Mr Xi on Monday that Italy plays an important role in China's relations with the EU, which are currently dominated by talks about tariffs, but added that she hopes to establish trade relations that are “as balanced as possible”. .
“As I have said many times, we were the only country among the important countries of Western Europe that were part of the Silk Road. But we weren't the country that had the best trade relationship with China,” Ms Meloni told reporters on Tuesday, referring to the One Belt One Road initiative.
“There are other countries in Europe that have a much larger volume of Chinese investment.”
