Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has urged the European Commission to move forward and unfreeze progress on the Mercosur pact to send a ‘political signal’ to China about the EU’s economic commitment to Latin America.
Diplomatic sources have stressed that the Spanish government wants to put limits on China’s growing political and economic influence in Mercosur countries, which include Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, as well as in the Latin American region as a whole.
In a letter to Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Friday, Sánchez reportedly stressed the “strategic importance” of Latin America for Europe, despite the reluctance of some EU countries such as France to boost trade relations between the blocs.
Source: euractiv.com