European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will not join French President Emmanuel Macron on his state visit to China next week, the Post has learned, in a break from recent tradition.
Macron has included the European Union on his last few engagements with Chinese President Xi Jinping. This was seen as an effort to “Europeanise” his dealings with Beijing.
Von der Leyen went to Paris last year to meet Xi alongside Macron and also visited Beijing in 2023 alongside the two-term centrist French leader. Before that, her predecessor Jean-Claude Juncker joined Macron and former German chancellor Angela Merkel when meeting Xi in 2019.
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Next week, however, there will be no EU leader present for any portion of Macron’s two-stop, three-day tour of China, sources said, even though the suggestion was floated by Paris.
“This time, the visit will be organised as a strictly bilateral one,” an Elysee source said, adding that Macron would have “an important conversation with President Xi Jinping about the future of EU-China relations”.
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“Therefore, the President will handle this himself, on behalf of France, and will report back to European partners, including the president of the European Commission, who will not be accompanying him on this visit,” the source said.
