 Macron begins China state visit at Silk Road gateway Xian, China (AFP) Jan 8, 2018 - French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday launched a state visit to China at the starting point of the ancient Silk Road, a nod to his Chinese counterpart's scheme to revive the famous trading route. Along with his wife Brigitte, Macron visited the famous terracotta warriors in the northern city of Xian, a centuries-old Big Wild Goose Pagoda -- a Buddhist site -- as well as the city's mosque. The 8,000-man clay army, crafted around 250 BC for the tomb of China's first emperor Qin Shihuang, is a symbol of ancient artistic and military sophistication in a country that proclaims itself a 5,000-year-old civilisation. Macron is beginning the three-day visit in Xian as a gesture to Chinese President Xi Jinping's colossal New Silk Road project, an ambitious initiative to connect Asia and Europe by road, rail and sea. The $1 trillion infrastructure programme is billed as a modern revival of the ancient Silk Road that once carried fabric, spices, and a wealth of other goods in both directions. Known in China as "One Belt One Road", the plan is to see gleaming new road and rail networks built through Central Asia and beyond, and new maritime routes stretching through the Indian Ocean and Red Sea. The project has elicited both interest and anxiety, with some in Europe seeing it as Chinese expansionism. While France had been cautious on it, Macron heartily endorsed the initiative in an interview with China.org.cn posted on Monday. "It represents a real opportunity to create bridges, through exchange, between countries and civilisations, just as the ancient silk routes once did," Macron said. "I think it's very important that Europe and China strengthen their collaboration on the initiative. France is ready to play a leading role in this." But he warned that it should be carried out "within the framework of a balanced partnership" -- a reference to concerns about China's trade surpluses. France has a 30-billion-euro trade deficit with China. He will deliver a keynote speech later in Xian on the future of Franco-Chinese relations. - Discussing rights privately - Macron's first official visit to Asia marks a new stage for his diplomacy, which has so far been concentrated on Europe and Africa. He plans to seek a "strategic partnership" with Beijing on issues including terrorism and climate change, and make Xi an ally in implementing the Paris accord to fight climate change after the US pulled out of the deal. After Xian, Macron will head to Beijing along with his delegation, which takes in some 60 business executives and institutions. Emmanuel and Brigitte Macron will meet with Xi and his wife, Peng Liyuan, Monday night. On Tuesday, he will visit the Forbidden City, meet top Chinese officials and oversee the signing of business deals. Human Rights Watch has urged Macron to publicly call for human rights improvements in China during his meeting with Xi, but the French president's office said the matter would be addressed privately.
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Depending on who you ask in Europe, China's colossal East-West infrastructure programme is either an opportunity or a threat -- and when French President Emmanuel Macron visits next week, Beijing will be watching to see how keen he is to jump on board.
Since China launched the New Silk Road plan in 2013, the hugely ambitious initiative to connect Asia and Europe by road, rail and sea has elicited both enormous interest and considerable anxiety.
"It's the most important issue in international relations for the years to come, and will be the most important point during Emmanuel Macron's visit," said Barthelemy Courmont, a China expert at French think-tank Iris.
The $1 trillion project is billed as a modern revival of the ancient Silk Road that once carried fabric, spices, and a wealth of other goods in both directions.
Known in China as "One Belt One Road", the plans would see gleaming new road and rail networks built through Central Asia and beyond, and new maritime routes stretching through the Indian Ocean and Red Sea.
Beijing would develop roads, ports and rail lines through 65 countries representing an estimate 60 percent of the world's population and a third of its economic output.
Macron, who heads to China for a three-day state visit on Sunday, will notably be accompanied by some 50 company chiefs keen to do business with the Asian powerhouse.
So far France has been cautious on the Silk Road plan, but Courmont said Chinese leaders were "waiting for a clear position" from Macron at a time when they view the young leader as an "engine" for growth in Europe.
"If Macron takes a decision on how to tackle the Chinese initiative, all of Europe will follow," Courmont predicted.
But, as Courmont acknowledges, Europe is divided on what to make of China's ambitions.
The continent could potentially benefit handsomely from increased trade over the coming decades, but in some corners there is suspicion that it masks an attempted Beijing influence grab.
"They are notably asking themselves about the geopolitical consequences of this project in the long-term," Alice Ekman, who covers China at the French Institute of International Relations, said of France and Germany.
- Win-win? -
In Central and Eastern Europe the programme has been met with altogether more enthusiasm, given the huge infrastructure investment that China could bring to the poorer end of the continent.
"Some consider the awakening of China and Asia as a threat," Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban told a summit in Budapest in November which gathered China with 16 Central and Eastern European countries.
"For us, it's a huge opportunity," he said, with Beijing using the summit to announce three billion euros of investment in projects including a Belgrade-Budapest railway line.
Bogdan Goralczyk, director of the Centre for Europe at the University of Warsaw, noted there were divisions even within eastern Europe, with Poland hesitant due to its right-wing government's "strong anti-communist stance".
Others to the west have made little effort to hide their concern.
Former Danish premier Anders Fogh Rasmussen fretted in a column for Germany's Zeit newspaper that "Europe will wake up only when it's too late, and when swathes of central and eastern Europe's infrastructure are dependent on China."
The former NATO chief noted that Greece -- a major recipient of Chinese largesse -- had in June blocked an EU declaration condemning Chinese rights abuses.
It came just months after Athens' Piraeus port, one of the biggest in the world, passed under Chinese control.
Germany, Europe's biggest economy, is favourable to Chinese investment, but has reservations.
"If we do not develop a strategy in the face of China, it will succeed in dividing Europe," Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel warned in August.
France is meanwhile seeking to "rebalance" relations with China during Macron's trip, according to his office -- eyeing a trade deficit of 30 billion euros, its biggest with any partner.
"Our Chinese partners would prefer a win-win situation. Why not? On the condition that it's not the same party that wins twice," French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Thursday.
"It is not France's intention to block China," he said.
"But we should establish a partnership based on reciprocity when it comes to the opening of markets."
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