On China, Berlusconi’s warning: “Capital penetration into the Italian economy”
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China as a silent, growing, and increasingly present threat. European Parliamentarian Silvio Berlusconi has turned the spotlight on the penetration of Chinese capital into the Italian economic fabric and, consequently, into the single European market. As a member of the Foreign Affairs commission of the Eurochamber, the leader of Forza Italia posed the question complete with a parliamentary question in which he warned of a reality with critical implications. “The risk of Europe’s dependence on China is incalculable,” he wrote on 11 November 2020, and not without knowledge of the facts.
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Berlusconi, on that occasion, pointed out to the European Commission how Chinese investments had gone from 573 million euros in 2015 to 4.9 billion in 2018. An economic weight that has increased by about eight times in just three years, including in strategic sectors . For him, the growing presence in companies that hold strategic infrastructure assets was a cause for “concern”. «The Chinese multinational State Grid alone holds 35% of CDP Reti spa. which controls the energy networks (Snam, Terna, Italgas)».
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Russian aggression against Ukraine was still far off and unthinkable, and relations with Russia, even if not ideal, were still, all in all, normal. In Berlusconi’s eyes, the energy question was starting to be raised, at least in Italy, and he was looking for answers to a presence of Beijing that had already been the subject of reasoning anyway. Because control of the main European ports was lifted in 2016 by the then Pd MEP Isabella De Monte. Berlusconi sat in the European Parliament from 1999 to 2001, and then from 2019 until today. He takes up the Chinese question again, convinced that this desire to control the Italian energy sector “is part of China’s plan for economic expansion in Europe”. He cites the Chinese acquisitions of the ports of Duisburg in Germany and Piraeus in Greece to draw attention, and show his lucidity for a foreign policy where the path of pragmatism has not spared him criticism.
As prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi spent his time building links with personalities who were as controversial as they were key to sensitive issues. In terms of migration, he understood that the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi could not be ignored, and he came to terms with them to stop the departures towards Italy. In relations between the West and Russia he chose the path of dialogue and cooperation with the leader Vladimir Putin, also for reasons of national interests. But going even further, given that, in recent times, he continued to side with him and unloading the Ukrainian president Zelensky, supported by the EU in this ongoing war.
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As a European parliamentarian, the reference to the geopolitical aspects and implications of a China that is too present. A reminder for Europe, but also for Italy and its Pd-5Stelle government led by Giuseppe Conte. “50,797 entrepreneurs born in the People’s Republic of China (17,000 in manufacturing) operate in Italy,” warned Berlusconi.
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