Germany Is Sabotaging Its Relations With China
The visit of German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt to Beijing 50 years ago was a visit that lifted German-Chinese relations to a completely new level. On 31 October 1975, Schmidt met the Chinese head of state Mao Zedong. In preparation he had read Mao’s poems. It was the first visit of a German chancellor to China.
Schmidt remained someone who, throughout his life, wanted to break with the colonial past of the West in China, and advocated relations on equal footing and with mutual respect. For example, in his discussion of the book The Governance of China by Chinese President Xi Jinping, he called on the West to replace arrogance with fair competition in its relationship with China.