German Chancellor Friedrich Merz will visit China. The trip comes as European leaders have been flocking to Beijing since the start of the year to hold talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, and after European leaders' public criticism of the United States at the recent Munich Security Conference. Attention is on what diplomatic choice Germany, which has championed "de-risking" from China, will make between economic realities and U.S.-China tensions.
China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially announced on the 23rd that Chancellor Merz will visit China from the 25th to the 26th. According to foreign media, Merz is expected to be accompanied on this trip by the largest-ever business delegation. It will include corporations from various sectors, including major automakers, that are struggling amid competition with Chinese companies.
After meeting Xi and other senior Chinese officials in Beijing, Merz is said to be visiting Hangzhou, which has emerged as the center of China's tech industry, to stop by Unitree (宇树科技), a leading Chinese humanoid (human-shaped robot) company. The move is seen as an effort to directly assess China's competitiveness in advanced manufacturing and artificial intelligence (AI).
Merz's biggest task on this visit is "balancing." Germany has put forward a de-risking strategy to reduce dependence on China, but as Europe's largest manufacturing nation, it has large trade volumes with China and is heavily affected by Chinese manufacturing, making it difficult to distance itself. At the same time, its alliance with the United States has been shaken recently over issues such as tariff and security, leading analysts to say Germany must both reduce its dependence on China and manage the relationship.
A diplomatic expert in Beijing said, "Basically, Europe's own economy is not in good shape, and U.S.-driven trade barriers have risen, so it has to consider ways to somewhat mitigate or resolve these risks," adding, "In particular, Germany has invested a lot in China and has heavily utilized the Chinese market, so it will be difficult to drive relations with China into hostility." The expert added, "Germany will pursue a strategy of properly managing ties with China while seeking to increase its national interest."
In fact, Germany's economic dependence on China is increasing. According to Bloomberg, in 2025 China was Germany's largest trading partner, with Germany's imports from China at €170.6 billion (about 291 trillion won) and exports at €81.2 billion (about 138 trillion won), widening the trade deficit. That same year, Germany's investment in China hit a four-year high. Whenever supply chain issues such as rare earths flare up, German manufacturers including automakers have faced production delays, and at the Munich Security Conference held on the 13th to the 15th, Merz expressed concern, saying, "China systematically exploits other countries' dependencies," and, "Raw materials, technology and supply chains are being turned into tools of power in a zero-sum game among great powers."
Some German corporations have taken a direct hit from the rise of Chinese manufacturing. Corporate bankruptcies in Germany surged from 13,993 in 2021 to 23,900 last year. As a result, Germany's unemployment rate last year was 6.3%, a record high since 2013. Bloomberg reported, "About 10,000 manufacturing jobs are disappearing every month in Germany," adding, "Some economists call this a 'second China shock.'"
Meanwhile, the U.S. view is also a burden. Earlier, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney visited China in January amid tensions with the United States and appeared to cozy up to Xi, after which the United States threatened tariffs. Bloomberg said, "U.S. officials have privately chastised Germany for not being tough enough on China," adding, "To avoid a clash with the United States, Merz plans to visit the U.S. four days after completing his China trip."