Cooperation is the defining feature of EU-China relations

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel will travel to China earlier next month to host the EU-China summit, more than 18 months after the previous summit.

This year's event is held against the backdrop of inflamed tensions across a range of issues between the EU and China.

The EU recently has been content to pursue a growing number of grievances with Beijing on the matter of trading, supply chain, technology and market access, which have been described as the so-called "China's economic practices". Some politicians have taken an increasingly hostile term against China, and intent on viewing China as a "competitor" or even "rival."

However, pursuing a confrontational policy benefits no one. EU should return to the position known as "win-win" whereby both parties seek to find compromise and deepen their bilateral engagement based on common interests.

China and the European economic community established their diplomatic relations in 1975, and the two parties elevated such relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership in 2003.

China's ambassador to the European Union said at a forum to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the EU-China Comprehensive Strategic Partnership last week that "the elevation to the comprehensive strategic partnership was a clear sign of our mature relationship."

China and the EU together constitute the single largest market by population in the world. Over the past two decades, the China-EU comprehensive strategic partnership has made great achievements on various fronts.

Trade value between China and the EU has increased by tenfold to $847.3 billion. European exports to China have provided about 4 million jobs in Europe. Moreover, China had set up over 2,800 companies through direct investment in Europe by the end of 2022, creating more than 270,000 jobs locally. There has also been a wide range of people-to-people exchanges beyond trade and investment.

Obviously, both parties have gained from each other's development and bilateral cooperation.

In framing the "China problem" in zero-sum terms and depicting the relationship with Beijing as disadvantageous, European leaders overlooked everything bilateral ties between the two parties have already achieved.

It is undeniable that the two sides have differing opinions on a range of issues, but their common interests far outweigh their differences.

As two major world economies, the relationship between China and the EU is highly consequential for the rest of the world and should be an anchor of stability rather than uncertainty.

The EU should accordingly return to a cooperative posture and seek win-win cooperation. Some politicians' willingness to drag the continent into geopolitical confrontation has been wholly damaging to European collective interests and also its economic growth. Europe should therefore stop seeing China as a "rival" and recognize more what open partnership can achieve.

(The writer Tom Fowdy is a British political and international relations analyst and a graduate of Durham and Oxford universities.)