Germany allows Chinese company to buy stakes in container operator at its largest port

The German cabinet on Tuesday approved China’s Cosco buyinga 24.9 per cent stake in HHLA, a container operator at Germany’s Hafen Hamburg port. The nod came despite calls from several quarters urging Chancellor Olaf Scholz to not let the Chinese company buy stakes in the firm.

Referring to the deal, Chinese foreign ministry spokespersonWang Wenbin said Beijing hoped that"relevant parties would see pragmatic cooperation between China and Germany rationally (and) stop gratuitous speculation."

Earlier, Cosco was attempting to buy a 35 per cent stake in the company. However, the smaller-than-planned stake was necessitated after Germany learned its painful lesson of being overtly dependent on a single country, in the aftermath of the Russian gas crisis.

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Yet,it appears thatScholz used his veto power to allow the deal to go through. As reported by WION, last month, German Economy Minister Robert Habeck said that Berlin couldn't be allowed to be blackmailed by other countries, hinting at China.

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He referred to Cosco-HHLA and said he was against the deal. "I’m leaning towards the fact that we don’t allow that," saidHabeck.

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Notably, China is Germany's biggest trade partner for the last six years. The volume of trade between the two nations reached $246 billion in 2021. However, the trade is imbalanced as Germany is much more dependent on China.

Berlin's trade deficit with Beijing has increased to almost $41 billion as of mid-2022. While German imports to China have only increased by 12.4 per cent in the first half of 2022 compared to 3.4 per cent in 2000, the German imports of Chinese goods have leapt an astronomical 45.7 per cent on a year-on-year basis.

China has been known to use its advantageous position in bilateral trade to coerce sovereign governments by bending them to its will. The German opposition has protested against the deal and questioned Scholz.

(With inputs from agencies)

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