The EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment: context and content

The negotiations for an EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) were completed, after seven years and 35 rounds, on December 30, 2020. The main text was published by the European Commission on January 22, and important annexes (which actually list sectors open for investment and the reservations made by each party) were published on March 12. According to François Godement, Senior Advisor for Asia at Institut Montaigne and author of this piece, “CAI is now in danger from both ends: it is hard to envisage a European Parliament ratifying the agreement while some of its members are sanctioned by China, and easy to imagine that China can sustain a test of will in today’s charged political atmosphere.”