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CHINA

Chinese state investor gets 40 percent of Volvo

Volvo Cars now has a government partner among its investors, but it is not the Swedish state, TV4's business news program Ekonominyheterna reported late on Wednesday.

Chinese state investor gets 40 percent of Volvo

It is regional state fund based in the northern Chinese petroleum city of Daqing, which participated in the purchase with Volvo parent Geely Automotive, also from China. With the deal, the investor will become a large minority shareholder, owning about 40 percent of Volvo Cars, according to TV4 data.

“The regional state fund is Geely’s external financial partner,” Anders Fogel, Geely’s spokesman in Sweden, told newspapers Dagens Industri, AFP reported. “We can’t immediately say what percentages the partners will have in Volvo Cars,” he added.

Olle Axelson, director of communications at Volvo Cars, is positive that a strong backer for the company is coming in.

“This signifies financial security for the deal,” he told news agency TT, referring to the deal Geely inked with Ford to acquire Volvo Cars for $1.8 billion on March 28th, almost four times less than what it had paid for the brand 11 years earlier.

According to Dagens Industri, quoting sources close to the deal, the purchase will be finalised in August, AFP reported. Geely has previously promised that no Swedish jobs will end up in China and that research and development would remain in Sweden.

When asked if he trusted Geely to keep its promises, Axelson said, “Of course, this has been clearly expressed to employees. One cannot move a car factory because it is such a regulated operation with thousands of subcontractors in many segments.”

Geely’s owners have previously said that they will open a production plant in China. It also plans to expand Volvo’s presence in China, now the world’s largest car market.

According to TV4, the state fund has imposed a requirement on the deal, allowing it to influence where the Chinese factory will be built.

“I do not know how this relationship works,” said Axelson in refernece to the kind of demands it can make as a major shareholder. “However, a plant cannot be built anywhere without it being in the right place logistically. There are many parameters that govern the decision.”

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CHINA

China derides Copenhagen democracy meet as ‘political farce’

China on Tuesday blasted a democracy conference in Copenhagen attended by Taiwan's president and a Hong Kong activist alongside Danish government officials this week, qualifying it a "political farce".

China derides Copenhagen democracy meet as 'political farce'
Demonstrators gathered outside the Copenhagen Democracy Summit on Tuesday. Photo: Emil Helms/Ritzau Scanpix

The Copenhagen Democracy Summit was held Monday and Tuesday in the Danish capital and organised by the Alliance of Democracies, an organisation targeted by Beijing sanctions in March and founded by former NATO boss Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

In addition to Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen and Hong Kong democracy activist Nathan Law, Danish Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod also participated in the forum by video link, which Beijing said violated “the one-China principle.”

“This summit is a political farce,” the Chinese embassy in Denmark wrote in a statement published on Tuesday. “Inviting those who advocate Taiwan and Hong Kong ‘independence’ to the meeting violates the one-China principle and interferes in China’s internal affairs,” it said.

“Some hypocritical western politicians are good at meddling in other countries’ internal affairs and creating divisions and confrontation in the name of ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’. They are bound to fail,” it added.

At the conference on Monday, Kofod said it was “deplorable” that Beijing had imposed sanctions on 10 European individuals and organisations in response to EU sanctions on Xinjiang officials over their actions against the Uyghur Muslim minority.

Like most countries, Denmark applies the one-China principle — under which Beijing bars other countries from having simultaneous diplomatic relations with Taipei — though it does maintain relations with Taiwan.

Cut off politically from the rest of China since the end of the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the territory is self-governing but is not recognised by
the United Nations.

Beijing considers Taiwan a rebel province that will one day return under its control, by force if necessary.

China’s sabre-rattling has increased considerably over the past year, with fighter jets and nuclear-capable bombers breaching Taiwan’s air defence zone on a near-daily basis.

“Our government is fully aware of the threats to regional security, and is actively enhancing our national defence capabilities to protect our
democracy,” Tsai told the conference in a video address on Monday. US President Joe Biden is expected to present his China strategy soon, as
calls mount for him to publicly commit to defending Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese attack.

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