Greece’s Prime Minister Antonis Samaras paid a four-day visit to China hoping to attract investment and promote the export of Greek products. He visited Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou and held talks with his Chinese host, Premier Li Keqiang. Samaras was accompanied by four Ministers and 60 Greek businesspeople.The two Premiers officiated at the signing ceremony of cooperation documents on trade, investment, shipping and agriculture. “Greece’s relations with China have been good for years. It is now important to further develop specific collaboration agreements regarding investment and exports,” Deputy Minister for Development Notis Mitarachi said. In 2008 Cosco acquired a stake in the main Greek port of Piraeus near Athens. Chinese investors are also interested in participating in the privatization of Athens international airport. Bilateral commerce between the two countries, negligible in the 1970s, jumped to €3.29 billion in 2010. There was a 50% increase in the sale of Greek olive oil in China in the first half of last year and a 1,175% increase in the sale of Greek wine between 2009 and 2011. The Greek-Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry estimates that between 60,000 and 100,000 Chinese tourists visited Greece in 2011. “Greece can become a real gateway for investment and trade flows between China and Europe,” Samaras told a Greek-Chinese business forum. Chinese President Xi Jinping told Samaras that China supported European integration and was prepared to work with Greece – which will hold the rotating EU presidency in 2014 – to push China-Europe relations.

On May 19, Premier Li Keqiang kicked off his first overseas trip since taking office, going to India, Pakistan, Switzerland and Germany during the week-long tour. Li’s maiden trip is expected to be dominated by India, with Beijing wary of India getting closer to the United States. One of Li’s core messages to New Delhi will be that the two rivals can be good neighbors. Premier Li Keqiang held talks with his counterpart Dr Manmohan Singh in New Delhi and witnessed the signing of eight cooperative agreements covering areas including agriculture, water resources and sewage management. China is India’s second-largest trading partner. Bilateral trade reached USD6.65 billion in 2012 and is expected to reach USD100 billion by 2015. Jiang Jingkui, Director of the Center of South Asian Studies of Peking University, said economic cooperation between the two neighbors, which together have 40% of the world’s population, has lagged far behind their potential. If well developed, this will give “a strong impetus” to the world economy, Jiang said. Sun Shihai, Expert on Indian studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), said that in 2025 India will have about 130 million extra workers, providing an opportunity for China’s manufacturing sector troubled by surging labor costs at home. Li will also go to Pakistan, Switzerland and Germany during the nine-day tour, which ends on May 27.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Chinese President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang in Beijing. Xi urged Netanyahu to restart peace talks with the Palestinians as soon as possible. Earlier, Netanyahu lauded Shanghai for its past role as a haven for Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi persecution on a visit to the city’s former ghetto. He also visited the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum, which includes the Ohel Moshe synagogue. “Seventy years ago, only Shanghai opened the door to provide a sanctuary to Jewish refugees,” Netanyahu said.  During the visit, Netanyahu had a coffee at the Café Atlantic, a newly opened recreation of an establishment from the 1940s when the area was known as “Little Vienna” for its coffee houses and shops. China and Israel set up a task force to deepen economic cooperation and boost trade. Li and Netanyahu also presided over the signing of five deals covering the aerospace industry, agricultural research, financial cooperation, science and technology, and Chinese language instruction. China’s imports from Israel totaled USD5.3 billion last year and its exports to Israel reached USD2.8 billion, says Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics. Li vowed to deepen cooperation with Israel in four areas – trade, technology transfer, agriculture and public works – and said China would encourage Chinese companies to participate in Israeli public works projects.

Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas arrived in Beijing for a state visit, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also set to meet Chinese leaders later this week. While Abbas was in Beijing, Netanyahu arrived in Shanghai. President Abbas planned to update Chinese leaders about the obstacles to Israeli-Palestinian talks and ask them to “use their relationship with Israel to remove the obstacles that obstruct the Palestinian economy”. China and Israel established diplomatic ties in 1992, and the last Israeli Premier to visit was Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, in 2007. Last year Israel imported USD5.32 billion in goods from China and exported USD2.74 billion, according to official figures.

Visiting French president François Hollande held talks in Beijing with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Keqiang and other leaders. Hollande is the first leader of a major Western country to visit China since President Xi took up his post last month. France wants to better balance trade with China as it registered a USD34 billion trade deficit with China last year. “Not by reducing our investment and exports, but by increasing them further,” Hollande said. China signed a deal with European plane maker Airbus to purchase 60 planes. The deal was worth at least USD8 billion at list prices, and included 18 wide-bodied A330s and 42 smaller A320-family jets. China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding and Eléctricité de France signed a cooperation deal on research into nuclear reactors and nuclear power plant maintenance and upgrading. The two sides also agreed to hold annual high-level talks, deepen their strategic dialogue, and establish an economic and financial dialogue. President Hollande said that he would lift “all obstacles, all brakes, all procedures” to encourage more Chinese investment in France, promising to eschew protectionist measures. Both countries signed 18 deals, including on tourism, agricultural products, nuclear power and urbanization. France is China’s fourth-largest trade partner in the EU while China is France’s largest trade partner in Asia. Bilateral trade between China and France reached USD11.23 billion in the first quarter of this year, declining 6.8% from a year earlier. Chinese exports dropped 6.7% to USD5.96 billion, and imports went down 6.8% to USD5.27 billion, according to the General Administration of Customs.

French billionaire François-Henri Pinault is to return two bronze animal heads that were looted from Beijing’s Summer Palace 153 years ago. He said that he was returning the artifacts on behalf of his family, which runs French luxury goods conglomerate Kering. They had been in the possession of several European collections before they were acquired by French businessman Pierre Berge and the late Yves Saint Laurent in the 1990s. The offer from company Pinault was “an expression of friendship toward the Chinese people,” the State Administration of Cultural Heritage said. “The Chinese side offers its high praise for this action and considers that it conforms with the spirit of relevant international cultural heritage protection treaties,” the Administration said. Five of the 12 bronze sculptures have already been returned to China and one is in Taiwan, but the whereabouts of four others remain unknown. The donation is a public relations move by Kering, formerly known as PPR, which owns a stable of businesses including Gucci and Alexander McQueen that are thriving in China’s booming luxury market.