EU mulls end to extradition treaties with China over Hong Kong electoral reform, but not every member state agrees
- Sources say proposal to suspend extradition treaties with Beijing will face resistance from some member states
- Foreign ministers will meet on Monday to announce light touch measures but tougher proposals are still under discussion
According to four sources familiar with discussions, the measures could include a suspension of member state extradition treaties with China, although they are yet to be finalised by the officials who are busy laying the groundwork for Monday’s meeting of all 27 EU foreign ministers.
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The Foreign Affairs Council, which meets each month, will announce a range of light touch measures that have already been agreed. These are fuzzy in nature and include more engagement with civil society and promotion of freedom of expression. Among them is a visit “when the situation allows” of high-level officials to Hong Kong to “engage with key stakeholders”, followed by a report chronicling the evolution of the rule of law in the city.
But the possibility of suspending the remaining extradition treaties among the EU member states is still under debate, for fear of reprisals from Beijing. Also up for discussion is a proposal to “welcome Hong Kong citizens who may be subject to repression”. This would include measures to “support the mobility of highly qualified workers, students and young people” into the EU.
The measures would require the support of Hungary, typically a sticking point on any action on China due to its staunchly pro-Beijing stance, the sources said.
They would need to be finalised by all 27 members by Friday if they are to be announced at Monday’s monthly council meeting, held by video conference.
Diplomats said there was a “fair chance” the juiciest measures, particularly around extradition treaties, would be watered down to make them more palatable, perhaps replaced with something “more vague” and “less confrontational”.
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One senior Western diplomat said it was “ridiculous” that any EU country maintained an extradition treaty with China, after every state except Czech Republic and Portugal had suspended their accords with Hong Kong.
“The optics of this is the problem, suspending extradition with Hong Kong, and keeping it with the mainland,” they said, adding that “the big problem we’re pushing into Friday is not language, it’s more to do with whether Hungary will back the thing or not”.
Currently, 10 EU member states have extradition treaties with China. They are Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania, and Spain.
While some of those nations, including Belgium, France and Lithuania, have been vocally critical of China in recent weeks – particularly on human rights issues – others have kept their counsel.
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For example, in a recent interview with Politico, Romania’s Prime Minister Florin Citu refrained from answering a question on human rights abuses on China, making it “very unlikely that Romania would take the lead on Hong Kong”, said Andreea Brinza, co-founder of the Romanian Institute for the Study of the Asia-Pacific.
“If the EU specifically requests the suspension of the extradition treaty, then Romania will do so. If there is disagreement at EU level and there isn’t support from Brussels or important players like Germany and France, then Romania will ignore it, as, unfortunately, the topic of human rights is not high on the government’s agenda,” she added.
The EU’s dilemma is added to by growing pressure from the Biden administration to join its coalition building exercises across multiple areas, including on China.
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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has been in Brussels for the second time in a month this week for Nato meetings. And, while on his last visit, Blinken assured the EU he “won’t force allies into an ‘us-or-them’ choice with China”, many in the bloc are finding it difficult to say no.
“Europe, Japan want to stay in the middle ground, but the more China continues to force their hands with coercive behaviour, the more we will have to choose and we will go for our values-driven foreign policy. China will drive Europe into Biden’s arms,” said a senior diplomat.
“We can see from this that they are not serious. If we designed a tool that would ensure the CAI would not pass, it would look quite like those sanctions,” they said.
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Martijn Rasser, senior fellow at the Centre for a New American Security and a former CIA intelligence officer, said there was “frustration and head-scratching” in Washington over Europe’s “lack of concrete action” on Hong Kong, but also a general acceptance that “it’s too late to improve the situation on the ground” there.
“So really the only policy options we have left are sanctions and other types of retaliation. But that’s not going to change things for the people of Hong Kong,” Rasser said.
Sanctions are not currently on the table and – according to Noah Barkin, group managing editor at research provider Rhodium Group’s China practice – are not likely to be any time soon.
Hong Kong is not expected to be “where the Europeans are going to take their stand”, he said. “Even though there’s a lot of concern about what China is doing in Hong Kong, my sense is that this is not the issue where Europe is going to really take a stand against China. They will issue statements of condemnation, of concern. but will they go beyond that? I would question that.”
