By Laurie Chen and Sarah Marsh
BEIJING/BERLIN (Reuters) -China's Premier Li Qiang will on Saturday embark on his first overseas trip since taking office, seeking to expand ties with Germany and France in a visit that comes a month after leading western democracies agreed to "de-risk" trade with Beijing.
Li will head the Chinese delegation for inter-governmental consultations with Germany set for June 20, the first face-to-face summit since 2018, before heading to Paris for an official visit and to attend a financial conference taking place June 22 to 23.
"The first stop of Premier Li Qiang's first visit after taking office is Germany, which fully reflects the great importance China attaches to China–Germany relations," foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told a daily press briefing on Thursday.
"In the face of the international turmoil, sluggish global economic recovery, and increasing common challenges for mankind, China looks forward to further deepening and expanding China–Germany relations.”
Beijing had opposed a communique issued during the Group of Seven (G7) summit attended by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and France's President Emmanuel Macron in Tokyo last month, in which the world's leading democracies outlined their shared approach to "de-risk, not decouple" economic engagement with China.
In a further display of the broader diplomatic strains between Beijing and the West, Berlin said China was a growing threat in its first national security review released on Wednesday.
Writing in his embassy's newsletter, China's ambassador to Germany, Ken Wu said "the de-risking conversation is destructive. We hope very much that Germany will decide for a reasonable stance on China and against any kind of separation or distancing from it."
China is Germany's top trading partner, and part of Li's mission will be to woo foreign investors back after three years of pandemic curbs which largely isolated the country from the rest of the world and sapped growth.
Berlin is the largest source of foreign investment from Europe to China, and German firms, in sectors including the automobile and chemical industries, have traditionally maintained a large presence in the country.
While in Germany, Li is due to attend a China-Germany economic and technological cooperation forum and, according to an official familiar with his plans, hold talks with business leaders.
Unlike his predecessor Li Keqiang, Li has no previous experience at central government level, though he did have contact with foreign firms during his stint as Communist Party chief in Shanghai, where he cultivated a business-friendly and pro-reform reputation.
His meteoric rise from that role to premier in March is partly attributed to his longtime loyalty to President Xi Jinping, having served as his chief of staff between 2004 and 2007, while Xi was provincial secretary of Zhejiang.
Scholz, who has faced criticism within his own coalition over relations of China, in November became the first G7 leader to visit China since the pandemic.
He has tried to secure a level playing field for European companies in China, while at the same time reduce Germany's heavy reliance on the Chinese market amid broader western efforts to 'de-risk' in areas like sensitive technologies and critical minerals.
"There's a question about whether you should be having these kind of sweeping, comprehensive consultations in the context of the relationship as it now is," said Andrew Small, author of 'No Limits: the Inside Story of China's War with the West'.
"It's not something other European countries are doing," he added.
(Reporting Laurie Chen and Liz Lee in Beijing and Sarah Marsh in Berline; Writing by John Geddie; Editing by Jason Neely, Emelia Sithole-Matarise & Simon Cameron-Moore)
