CHOICE Newsletter: De-risking in Action: Chinese Solar & E-Commerce

Dear reader,

This issue looks at how Europe’s relationship with China is being reshaped not only through major strategic decisions, but also through measures that may initially appear technical – and through Beijing’s own evolving efforts to influence the debate in Brussels.

We are also delighted to share that CHOICE has received a generous grant from Stiftung Mercator, complementing the continued support of our long-term partner, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). Over the coming years, the Mercator funding will help us further develop the CHOICE platform and, in particular, expand our activities for young analysts and the Women Insight on China (WiCH) network. The project will strengthen mentoring and cooperation among women China experts in Europe, continue monitoring their representation in public debates, and create a public database that will make Europe’s female expertise on China easier to find – and harder to overlook.

We hope you enjoy this summer edition and find plenty in it worth reading, sharing, and debating.

Ivana Karásková, CHOICE Founder and Team Lead (based in Prague)

CHOICE Quick Takes

This summer, Brussels continues to translate the rhetoric of de-risking into concrete measures. On July 1, the EU’s new customs duty on low-value parcels entered into force, targeting the flood of cheap Chinese e-commerce goods. The Commission also moved to exclude “high-risk” suppliers – effectively Chinese manufacturers – from EU-funded renewable projects over solar inverter security concerns. We invited two experts to unpack these two steps: one on why Europe no longer trusts Chinese inverters, and the other on the parcels duty’s China angle.

Konrad Szatters, China Analyst and Editor at AMO

Why Europe No Longer Trusts Chinese Solar Inverters 

The European Commission’s decision to restrict EU funding for renewable energy projects using solar inverters from “high-risk” suppliers marks a significant shift in Europe’s approach to energy security. While not an outright ban, the measure effectively excludes Chinese manufacturers from EU-funded projects and reflects a broader recognition that critical energy infrastructure can no longer be treated as an ordinary commercial market.

Chinese state-backed actors have repeatedly been linked to cyberattacks against European critical infrastructure and governments, including the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs. There is also mounting evidence that Western power grids have become a direct target of Chinese state-linked offensive research. Open-source research has uncovered hundreds of Chinese academic studies examining how to disrupt and collapse Western power grids, many authored by Chinese researchers affiliated with Chinese universities closely linked to the People’s Liberation Army and China’s intelligence establishment.  

Against this backdrop, it is hardly surprising that both Brussels and Washington are reducing their dependence on Chinese technology. Beijing should therefore spare Europe the familiar demands to “stop politicizing” security, “respect the legitimate interests of Chinese companies,” and create a “fair, just and non-discriminatory business environment.” After years of cyberattacks and systematic capability-building against Western critical infrastructure, those demands no longer carry much weight. 

A Small Fee, a Bigger Strategic Question

The recently introduced €3 customs charge on low-value packages is aimed at addressing unfair competition, consumer and environmental risks emanating largely from China, which sends 91 percent of those items.

This measure comes at a time when the wider context of intensifying tensions between the EU and China is increasingly taking shape. Competition with China is now structural as Beijing refuses to change the terms of engagement. Sustained subsidies, an undervalued currency, and aggressive displacement strategies in ‘third markets’ such as those in Southeast Asia and the Middle East are just a few Chinese policy elements that drive industrial decline in the EU. Moreover, the world is rapidly shifting to bloc configurations with China and the US increasingly acting as self-enclosed entities with subservient hinterlands.

The EU has been responding with various measures, such as anti-subsidy tariffs on Chinese EVs and 44 trade defense investigations involving Chinese entities, among others. The legal set of instruments potentially utilized against China – for instance, the anti-coercion tool – is largely in place. Political cohesion within the EU in support of a more forceful posture against Beijing is strengthening. Still, there are EU member states, most notably Spain, keen on riding with China’s expansionist policies in Europe. In this context, the €3 customs charge appears more like another haphazard and partial reaction than an element of a strategy of accumulating EU leverage to nudge China toward a rebalancing of its approach.

CHOICE in Brussels

China’s Mission to the EU: An Evolving Strategy

At the beginning of September, Cai Run will celebrate two years as the head of the PRC Mission to the EU in Brussels. The position is a prestigious one for Chinese diplomats, as reflected in the fact that Cai’s predecessor, Fu Cong, moved from Brussels directly to the PRC Mission to the UN in New York. 

Over the course of this year, I have heard Cai Run described by people who have met him as “pleasant,” “friendly,” and “quite different” from his predecessor, who was well known as a wolf-warrior diplomat. This reflects a broader evolution in the Mission’s approach to navigating developments in Brussels, from the EU Commission’s hardline on Beijing and escalating trade disputes between Beijing and Brussels to the hot-and-cold interactions with the EP. The result has, in part, been an intensified presence of Chinese diplomats in the EP since restrictions on MEPs meeting Chinese officials were lifted last year. Some MEPs routinely receive invitations from the Mission to meet in Strasbourg “to talk about EP affairs and China-EU cooperation.” 

Less discussed is the PRC Mission’s growing presence in European media through sponsored content. According to my ongoing research, in 2024 and 2025 the PRC Mission to the EU sponsored as many as 35 articles published in Euractiv, a prominent European news outlet. Presented as opinion pieces, these articles are attributed to a range of authors. Some are written by Mission staff, others by Cai Run himself, and, since 2024, some by “independent commentators” or even journalists from Euractiv’s Advocacy Lab. This practice is not unique to the PRC Mission – the Kazakhstan Mission to the EU has also published sponsored articles in Euractiv – but it reflects an effort to adapt the Missions’ communication in order to make PRC narratives and arguments more visible in the EU policy debate. So while Europe may be a “second-field player” in Beijing’s eyes, the PRC Mission is nevertheless working to ensure that Brussels professionals feel they are at the very center of its attention.

WiCH Highlights

Ágnes Szunomár, our co-chair for Hungary, wrote a research article about China’s state-driven industrial push for the green transformation. Read it here!

Nataliya Butyrska, our co-chair for Ukraine, spoke about Asian countries’ support for Ukraine in a discussion organized by the Ukraine Media Center. Read it here!

 Meia Nouwens, our co-chair for the United Kingdom, co-authored a chapter on the evolving military doctrine of the People’s Liberation Army for the Asia-Pacific Regional Security Assessment 2026. Read it here! 

CHOICE News

 Ivana Karásková wrote an article analyzing China’s FIMI activities in the Czech Republic for Deník N (read it here) and commented on Tomio Okamura’s trip to China for ČTK (read it here) and Blesk (read it here). 

 Sense Hofstede spoke to the SCMP about the EU’s stark new strategy paper and China (read it here), to TVP about Europe’s ability to break free from China (watch it here), and commented for Table.Briefings about the EEAS and China (read it here).

  Paulína Ovečková spoke to Respekt about the motivations behind Tomio Okamura’s recent trip to China (read it here) and to Forbes Czech Republic about recent developments in China’s economy (read it here).

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