On August 24, 2020, State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Hungarian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó jointly met the press after their talks in Beihai, Guangxi Province. A journalist asked about the sanctions on a growing number of Chinese companies by the United States and its claim that complete decoupling between the US and China is still a policy option. What is the Chinese side's view on this? What impact will this have on China-Europe cooperation?

Wang Yi said, the so called "decoupling" is neither workable nor reasonable. If one only makes political manipulation on decoupling, he or she will be doomed to fail as the practice disregards one's own development needs and also harms public interests.

Today is an era of globalization. All countries can give play to their comparative advantages in the global allocation of production factors and achieve faster development. As President Xi Jinping pointed out, the world economy has become an ocean and it is impossible to channel the waters in the ocean back into isolated lakes. The mutual integration of various economies is a natural product of the in-depth development of the international division of labor. Forced decoupling of existing cooperation between countries completely goes against the market economy principles and the willingness of companies. It will harm those who propose it like a boomerang. The fact that China and the US have established diplomatic relations for more than 40 years shows that the two countries should make use of each other's advantages instead of decoupling with each other, integrate with each other instead of isolating from each other, and conduct mutually beneficial cooperation instead of creating conflicts and confrontations, so as to maintain and promote people's well-being in both countries.

Wang Yi said, from the first day of reform and opening-up, China has actively been integrating into the tide of globalization. China's development is closely linked with opening-up, and its future development with higher quality also requires a higher level of opening-up. We believe the suggestions and expectations raised by some countries on China's economy are all problems in the process of development. They will surely be solved properly as China further deepens reforms and expands opening-up.

Wang Yi said, both China and Europe are open economies. As supporters of globalization and a multilateral trade system, we should not allow the call for decoupling to disrupt the normal operation of the global industrial chain and supply chain, let alone allow unilateral hegemonic acts to sabotage normal international economic exchanges. As independent sovereign countries, we certainly need to safeguard our respective economic sovereignty, including sovereignty in cyberspace. This does not mean that we keep the market closed to each other, but requires us to make our economic integration more standardized and our mutual opening-up more sustainable.

Wang Yi emphasized, China is the world's largest potential market. As China is further stimulating and revitalizing domestic demand, China will provide countries around the world with broader development space and greater market opportunities. Under the circumstance of the normalization of the epidemic prevention, China's insisting on holding the annual International Import Expo stands as a strong proof. China cannot develop in isolation from the rest of the world, and the development of the world needs China. Any attempt to decouple from China is to decouple from the world's future largest market, to decouple from its own major development opportunities, and to decouple from the unstoppable trend of the times.