Italy quits Belt and Road plan as Europe rethinks China relations

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Italy, the only G7 country to join China’s flagship Belt and Road Initiative, will leave the global infrastructure program when its contract expires next year — the latest sign of hardening European attitudes to Beijing and its global ambitions.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Thursday confirmed the widely expected move, a campaign pledge during her run for office last year amid complaints the deal signed with China by a previous government in 2019 had brought few benefits to Italy’s economy.

Meloni stressed however that Rome could maintain good ties with Beijing outside the program, which has expanded China’s global influence while raising concerns it has saddled some countries with unmanageable debt.

“I think that we should … improve our cooperation with China on trade, the economy,” Meloni told reporters, according to Reuters, in her first public comments on the issue after reports Italy had told China of its decision not to extend the pact after it expires in March 2024.

“The tool of the (BRI) … has not produced the results that were expected,” she added.

Italy’s move comes as the European Union has embarked on a campaign to “de-risk” its supply chains from China’s and secure sensitive technologies after the bloc deemed Beijing a “systemic rival” in 2019.

Those frictions were on show Thursday during a summit between EU heads and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing, where the two sides grappled with points of contention from trade to Russia’s war in Ukraine — with little concrete progress made.

China’s Foreign Ministry took a measured tone