China will provide $100 million in aid to the Palestinians to help alleviate the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and support reconstruction efforts, President Xi Jinping said on Thursday.
Xi was speaking at a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron after their meeting in Beijing.
French President Emmanuel Macron urged Chinese leader Xi Jinping to boost cooperation on geopolitics, trade and the environment, as the European Union seeks China’s help in ending the war in Ukraine and Beijing looks for economic wins from US tariffs.
On his fourth state visit, Macron is walking a delicate tightrope, trying to reduce France’s massive trade deficit with China and secure industrial jobs at home to bolster his legacy, without antagonising the world’s second-largest economy.
China, for its part, wants to ease trade frictions with the 27-strong EU over its heavily subsidised electric vehicle industry, while presenting itself as a more reliable market to the US for economies hit by President Donald Trump’s tariffs.
“The imbalances we see accumulating today are not sustainable; they carry the risk of triggering a financial crisis and threaten our ability to grow together,” Macron told his host during their Thursday meeting at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People.
“There are solutions,” he said, calling for rules that were fairer and stronger, rather than based on “survival of the fittest.”
