Luxembourg Follows Italy To Join China’s Belt and Road Initiative

March 28, 2019 (EIRNS)—Despite criticism heaped on Italy by the European Union last week for joining China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Xavier Bettel signed an agreement with China on March 27 to also cooperate on the BRI, Bloomberg reported.

Last year, the Bank of China listed € 700 million in bonds in Luxembourg as part of the BRI. And in 2018, Finance Minister Pierre Gramegna said that the Chinese authorities clearly view Luxembourg as the ideal base for Chinese banks to develop in the European Union. “The signing of this agreement represents a new stage in the development of Sino-Luxembourg relations and our cooperation in economic, commercial, academic and cultural activities, as well as research and development,” the prime minister said today, reported Delano, a Luxembourg magazine, on its news page.

Bettel was in China to attend the Boao Forum for Asia, which is styled on the Davos World Economic Forum and takes place on Hainan Island. “The presence of a Luxembourg delegation at the Boao Forum for Asia is testament to the quality of our ties,” Bettel said. The aim of our participation in the forum is to deepen them, especially in the economic, finance and logistics fields, Bettel said, Delano reported.