EU-China relations with Pakistan

Academic Paper from the year 2022 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Topic: Globalization, Political Economics, grade: 1,0, , course: Rise of China and the implications for the EU in Asia, language: English, abstract: The EU and Pakistan significantly strengthened its partnership in the last decade. The EU states on its official website that Pakistan is a major development partner of the EU, with one of the largest programs in Asia. For the 2014-2020 period, the amount available for bilateral cooperation with Pakistan is ?603 million Euros, complemented with a bilateral investment allocation of ?15 million. Accounting for 14.3% of Pakistan's total trade in 2020, the Union is Pakistan's second most important trading partner, and ships over 28% of Pakistan's total exports. On the other hand, Pakistan was the EU's 42nd largest trading partner only, accounting for 0.3% of EU trade. We can clearly observe a difference in both parties' trade relations: Pakistan is far stronger dependent on the EU's market than vice versa. Regarding security policies, both parties held a Joint Press release in 2019 focussing on Afghanistan's peace process, stressing that this process should be truly Afghan-led and owned. However, the joint work on security related issues has not been very close nor specific but quite vague, as the EU - Pakistan Strategic Engagement Plan (SEP) suggests. Instead, the EU addresses topics that cover political relations, actions to contain COVID-19, humanitarian aid, economic and trade relations, as well as development cooperation. Recent statements on Pakistan by the EU foreign ministers underline efforts to build a strong long-term EU-Pakistan partnership and indicate full European support for democracy in the country. What that means in real policies remains unclear for both sides, however. The EU's inability in providing military support just yet means that it has only limited influence.