From Euronews, November 4/updated today:
The war in Ukraine and suspected acts of sabotage on key infrastructure are forcing European countries to rethink their approach to what is critical and who should control it.
And here, it's not so much Russia that European Union leaders fear, but China.
"The greatest fear, I think, is that critical infrastructure could be taken out by China in a situation of conflict, or at least that China could threaten us to take out the critical infrastructure," Dr Tim Rühlig, a research fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), told Euronews.
Chinese companies own or have stakes in a wide range of European critical infrastructure, including ports, airports, electricity companies, wind and solar farms as well as telecommunications.
The boom years were between 2012 and 2015 when Europe, in the grips of a severe financial crisis, took drastic austerity measures that included the sale of such large infrastructure.
Now Chinese companies own stakes in ports in EU countries, including Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, as well as in airports such as in Toulouse, France.
Yet the geopolitical climate has shifted dramatically.
'China became more authoritarian'"The past six, seven years have seen two things. China became more authoritarian, economically less allied with us, more divergent," Agatha Kratz, a director for the independent research centre Rhodium Group, told Euronews."And on the European side, also a realisation of these very, very strong differences in word views, economic views, political views," she added.
Such control over this kind of infrastructure already carries risks in peacetime, including espionage but also the possibility for China to use these commercial hubs in Europe to favour their companies over regional ones....
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