Scholz comes out for Beijing

Photo by Ian Taylor on Unsplash

The Story

Olaf Scholz is on a roll.

After using his Chancellor’s veto to force his coalition into agreeing to a nuclear extension, he’s now planning to drive through the Chinese acquisition of a stake in a container terminal at Hamburg harbour - despite near universal opposition to the deal inside his government.

The Chancellor is apparently refusing to allow his cabinet to discuss a recommendation to block the deal that was brought forward by the Economy Ministry.

The German cabinet has the power to block foreign purchases of critical infrastructure. But if it doesn’t act by the end of the month, the deal will go through automatically.

Six different German ministries assessed the purchase over security concerns and all concluded that it would give Beijing undue leverage over German infrastructure.

The ministries reportedly had misgivings about the fact that Chinese state logistics company Cosco would get a seat on the board of the terminal operator as well as…