View of the port of Hamburg on the river Elbe, last March. /
The giant Cosco settles in the strategic infrastructure
The German council of ministers under the orders of the federal chancellor, the social democrat Olaf Scholz, approved this Wednesday the controversial sale to the Chinese consortium Cosco of an important, although limited, participation in the port of Hamburg, the largest in the country. Despite the reluctance of the green and liberal government partners, the warnings from Brussels and the President of Germany himself, Frank Walter Steinmeier, the Chinese group will have a 24.9% stake in the smallest of the four large docks of the aforementioned container unloading port. Cosco aspired to acquire a 35% stake, which was lowered at the request of the German government after arduous negotiations between Social Democrats, Greens and Liberals. The Federal Chancellor himself, who will soon make an official visit to China, defended the sale to the Chinese shipowner and has ended up imposing the operation on his partners in the Executive.
As many as six federal ministries had previously advised against the sale because of the influence China could end up having over what is considered strategic infrastructure. Numerous politicians in Berlin and Brussels, but also Steinmeier, recalled what dependency on a dictatorial country leads to, as in the case of gas and Russia. The agreement agreed within the Executive contemplates, however, several clauses that significantly limit the field of maneuver of the Chinese maritime giant. Cosco may not have “contractual veto rights on strategic business or personnel decisions” and is prohibited from appointing “members of the executive team.” The Federal Minister of Economy, the green Robert Habeck, had warned that Germany cannot enter new dependencies on third countries with non-democratic regimes when it is sweating the fat drop to get rid of Russia and its energy supply.
Activists protest this Wednesday against the entry of the Chinese consortium in the port of Hamburg. The banner reads ‘Scholz: No port sales to China!’ /
“For the future, we must take into account the lessons learned and reduce unilateral dependencies whenever possible, especially with China,” the German head of state had said last night. With an eye on Russia’s invasive war in Ukraine, he stressed that there is no certainty that an economic exchange will lead to a political rapprochement. The confidence he had placed in exchange policy through trade is gone, Steinmeier said. Also the leader of the conservative opposition, Friedrich Merz, harshly criticized Scholz. “I don’t understand how the federal chancellor can insist on moving it forward in such a situation,” said Merz, for whom “the priority should not be the financial aspects of the operation, but the political-strategic ones.”
Numerous experts have warned of the growing power of the Chinese group Cosco in Europe, where it already participates in numerous ports of a strategic nature for the continent. In Greece, it controls 100% of the important port of Piraeus, but also 40% of the port of Bilbao and more than 50% of the port of Valencia, and has significant holdings in other major continental docks such as Zeebrugge or Antwerp in Belgium.