ANALYSIS: German Foreign Minister Steps on Beijing’s Red Lines During China Visit

Chinese Communist Party had no choice but to swallow its pride

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock speaks during a joint press conference with Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang (not pictured) at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China on April 14, 2023. Suo Takekuma/ Pool/Getty Images

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock was given some of the highest-level receptions during her recent visit to China. However, she stepped on Beijing’s red line during several speeches, especially on the Taiwan Strait and the Russia-Ukraine war.

Baerbock’s inflexible position on universal values has been a headache for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). But given Germany’s international stature and China’s deteriorated economy, the CCP had no choice but to swallow its pride.

Amid growing internal and external challenges, Beijing is anxious to repair relations with Western nations.

Baerbock visited Beijing from April 13 to 15 at the invitation of the Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Qin Gang, the country’s second-highest diplomat. She was received by three top-level CCP officials, including Vice President Han Zheng, which was widely perceived as a groundbreaking arrangement.

During a meeting with Qin on April 14, Baerbock called on Beijing not to use force against Taiwan.

Baerbock said that “unilaterally changing the status quo across the Taiwan Strait—and, in particular, by force—would be, for us as Europeans, unacceptable.”

She called on all parties to “not escalate the tension.”

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang attend a joint press conference at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on April 14, 2023, in Beijing, China. Suo Takekuma /Pool/Getty Images

The CCP claims Taiwan as a Chinese province even though Taiwan is a de facto independent country with a military, democratically-elected government, and constitution. The CCP has never ruled out the use of force to bring the island under its control.

In a meeting with Baerbock on April 15, the CCP’s top foreign affairs official, Wang Yi, asked Germany to support the reunification of mainland China and Taiwan—as he claimed that the CCP had previously supported the “unification of East Germany and West Germany.”

However, Wang’s citation of “German reunification” and “peaceful unification” of Taiwan was widely regarded as a slip of the tongue error, contradicting the CCP’s public assertion that it might take Taiwan by force.

In addition to red-line topics such as the Taiwan Strait, Baerbock clarified Germany’s stance on the Russia-Ukraine war and human rights issues in China.

“For the first time, [Baerbock] was able to clearly state the baseline of Germany’s new China strategy,” said  Mikko Huotari, the executive director of the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS), a Berlin-based think tank according to RFI.

Hu Xizhen, former editor-in-chief of the Chinese state-owned Global Times, had sour words of praise for the German Foreign Minister’s principled stance.

“Baerbock’s performance in China was justified, as she expressed her disagreement with Taiwan, human rights, and Ukraine, although her language was non-threatening to Beijing,” Hu wrote on Chinese microblogging Weibo on April 16.

“China respects Germany, including our State Councilor and Foreign Minister Qin Gang, who went to Tianjin to accompany Baerbock visiting German companies and took the high-speed train with her to Beijing, fully playing host to her,” Hu added, setting aside his usual wolf warrior diplomacy-style comment.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang attend a joint press conference at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse on April 14, 2023, in Beijing, China. Suo Takekuma/Pool/Getty Images

Green Party Member

Baerbock, 42, has been a member of the Bundestag—German federal parliament—since 2013.

In her first term, she served as a member of the Committee on Economic Affairs and Energy and the Committee on European Affairs.

On Jan. 27, 2018, she was elected as one of two equal chairpersons of the Green Party, along with Robert Haberke.

In 2021, Baerbock became the chancellor candidate of the Greens. Under her leadership, the Greens won 14.8 percent of the national vote in the 2021 election and 118 seats in the Bundestag, the best result in the party’s history.

After the election, the Greens entered a new coalition government with the FDP and the Social Democrats, and Baerbock became the country’s first female foreign minister.

During her visit to Poland in December 2021, Baerbock supported Warsaw’s efforts to prevent Belarusian migrants from entering the European Union.

After the U.S. military withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021, Baerbock promised to accelerate the evacuation of 15,000 Afghan employees and dependents, including those working for the German government.

“We cannot allow hundreds of thousands of children to die because we don’t want to take action,” she said.

After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Baerbock argued against excluding Russia from the SWIFT network, which would cut off Russia’s ability to trade foreign currency. And she refused to supply German weapons to Ukraine, arguing that the crisis should be resolved by diplomatic means.

However, she changed her stance on both after the Russian army was revealed to have killed Ukrainian civilians in April.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock speaks during debates at the Bundestag over Germany's policy towards Ukraine on Jan. 27, 2022, in Berlin, Germany. Sean Gallup/Getty Images

She advocates a tougher and more unified EU foreign policy toward Russia and the Chinese communist regime. She supports NATO’s eastward progress and hopes to strengthen cooperation with the United States.

Baerbock also criticized China’s position on the Russia-Ukraine war, saying that as a member of the United Nations Security Council, China has a special responsibility and that it would be inappropriate for Beijing to retreat to a so-called neutral role.

French-German Contrast: Soft vs. Tough

Baerbock’s visit contrasted French President Emmanuel Macron’s recent visit to China, where he appeared to have pandered to Beijing.

The French leader has sparked anger by calling on the European Union to reduce dependence on the United States and actively avoid taking a stance against China’s aggression toward self-ruled Taiwan.

“The paradox would be that, overcome with panic, we believe we are just America’s followers,” Macron said in the interview published on April 9. “Is it in our interest to accelerate [a crisis] on Taiwan? No. The worse thing would be to think that we Europeans must become followers on this topic and take our cue from the U.S. agenda and a Chinese overreaction.”

His words were met with a tidal wave of criticism.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping shakes hands with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron as they attend the official welcoming ceremony in Beijing on April 6, 2023. Ng Han Guan/Pool/AFP via Getty Images

In stark contrast to Macron, Baerbock firmly opposed the use of any force in the Taiwan Strait and warned that any attempt by the Chinese communist regime to control Taiwan would be unacceptable to Europe.

She emphasized that “conflicts may only be resolved peacefully” during her China visit.

“Fifty percent of world trade crosses the Taiwan Strait daily, and a military escalation there would be the worst possible scenario for the world … especially for an industrialized country like Germany,” Baerbock said to the media during her visit to Tianjin, according to Voice of America.

Stance on China

Baerbock told the German newspaper Die Tageszeitung in December 2021 that the EU needs a shared “European China policy” where all 27 member states are united, rather than when Germany, the largest member state sets its own policy toward the Chinese communist regime, as it has done in the past.

According to Baerbock, foreign policy and values are a combination of dialogue and assertiveness.

On Dec. 29, 2021, Baerbock announced that she would not attend the Beijing Winter Olympics.

“The way Beijing’s leaders have treated tennis player Peng Shuai or the arrested Chinese journalist Zhang Zhan, there is a real need to take a good look at the Olympics,” she said, adding that journalism is not a crime and that Zhang should be released.

Peng Shuai is a Chinese tennis star who disappeared in November 2021 after accusing former Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli of sexual assault. Zhang Zhan is a citizen journalist sentenced for reporting on the pandemic in China.