The state must protect “copyrights”: With such a rhetoric, the people’s Republic wants to appease donors from abroad. A new law is also aimed at the trade conflict with the United States.
China’s National people’s Congress has passed a law to foreign investment, which could facilitate a settlement of the trade dispute with the United States. 2929 delegates of the non-freely elected Parliament voted in favour, eight voted against it or abstained. The law removes the constraint of technology transferns from foreign to Chinese partner companies, and prohibits “illegal interference of the government” in foreign operations.
Experts in the law, a Signal to the United States, but Europe, too, that Beijing will take more steps to open up the market. Despite substantial improvements in the Chinese leadership remains, but also continues to be a large game room, to make access more difficult for foreign companies.
Intellectual Theft
The government in Washington had accused the people’s Republic of multiple intellectual theft, with a view to US technology. Also, foreign companies would be disadvantaged systematically in China. The two largest economies in the world since around a year in a Trade dispute and were covered since then, with punitive tariffs on Goods in a total value of more than 360 billion USD (318 billion euros).
China’s President Xi Jinping (left) and Premier Li Keqiang during the national people’s Congress session
Beijing and Washington are currently negotiating a settlement of the trade dispute. US President, Donald Trump said on Thursday that the negotiations were expected to be completed within four weeks. “We get what we need,” he highlighted.
For China, foreign investments are important, because the economy of the people’s Republic suffers under the trade dispute with the United States increasingly. At the beginning of the month, Prime Minister Li Keqiang for China a growth target of six to six and a half percent for 2019 was announced. In the past year, the economy still grew by 6.6 percent.
jj/ie (dpa, afp)