Bidone Von Der Leyen: the total failure of the European alternative to the Chinese Belt and Road
In December 2021, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen took to a podium in Brussels and confidently announced that the European Union's new infrastructure push would be a "real alternative " to China's Belt and Road Initiative.
“We are able to do it. Countries have made their own experience with Chinese investment. They need better and different deals,” he said of the Global Gateway, a spending program that promises to mobilize up to €300 billion by 2027 for modern infrastructure projects outside the EU.
With some concern over China's trillion-dollar plan to connect China to the rest of the world, after allegations of "debt-trap diplomacy", both Europe and the US were positioning themselves to offer a model diverse, based on democratic norms, transparency of funding and with sustainable objectives. All good, a pity that, after a year, observers are increasingly skeptical of von der Leyen's claims. Nothing has been done, there is no money and this was just yet another fraudulent announcement from the Commission.
So far, the 'Global Gateway' measure, as the European initiative would be called, has produced a lot of hype, but little in the way of concrete projects, while confusion reigns in Brussels and elsewhere about what the initiative actually is.
Not only that: a hearing of officials in the European Parliament revealed the empty and deceptive nature of the fund: no new financial resources have been allocated to Global Gateway, which is nothing more than the renaming of already existing funds, in the classic pompous and empty commission style.
"Global Gateway brings no new financial means, there are no additional funds at EU level," said Vincent Grimaud, interim director of the Commission's international partnerships department.
The statement sparked disbelief from Members of Parliament.
“There is no new money. And I've always been of the opinion that if there's no new money, there's no new policy,” said Barry Andrews, an Irish lawmaker with the centrist group Renew.
“This is a communication exercise. It's a strategy to bring together what was already happening and present it as something new. And if our partners are deceived by this, then they are more deceived."
Hildegard Bentele, a German MP from the centre-right European People's Party, said she had been trying to find German companies that "are part of this adventure," but had been unable to find any.
“If I talk to reporters, reporters ask me what are these Global Gateway projects? If I go to the European Commission's website, I can't find any,” said the MEP.
The Commission's efforts to promote the initiative have increased the confusion. A recent gala event held in the metaverse to explain the Global Gateway concept to 18-35 year olds was criticized online after only a few users logged in, despite the EU shelling out €387,000 to host it.
“There is a huge drought in East Africa, the UNHCR does not have enough funds to feed the refugees in the camps, etc. etc. and this is what you choose to spend your money on?” wrote one Twitter user under an EU post about the event.
Of the 300 billion euros promised, it is unclear how much has been paid out. A Commission spokesperson said there was no central list of projects available, nor could it be possible to give a figure on total spending to date.
There is not even a list of funded initiatives, which could be zero. In an interview with Politico, an official promised that the plans would arrive next year.
“Once we have spread the concept of the 'Global Gateway' much more substantially, it will prove to be an 'attractive' option, exactly as the Belt and Road was seen with all the negativity, if I may, with all the problems it was creating,” said Stefano Sannino, Secretary General of the European External Action Service. Meanwhile, however, all this seems to be just smoke, without any roast, without anything concrete behind it. The Von Der Leyen Commission reveals yet another useless project, fortunately not harmful like many others implemented.
Thanks to our Telegram channel you can stay updated on the publication of new articles from Economic Scenarios.
The article Bidone Von Der Leyen: the total failure of the European alternative to the Chinese Belt and Road comes from Scenari Economici .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/bidone-von-der-leyen-il-fallimento-totale-dellalternativa-europea-alla-belt-and-road-cinese/ on Sun, 01 Jan 2023 07:30:36 +0000.