A Chinese-produced electric bus is operating for Movia in Copenhagen on October 31, 2025. Photo: AFP

　　The European Union’s climate chief has claimed that the bloc must resist China’s growing influence in clean technologies, while criticizing recent efforts by the UK and Canada to seek closer cooperation with China – a stance analysts say reflects a tendency to replace technical rationality with political labeling, a move that could ultimately undermine Europe’s own climate ambitions.

　　The EU must resist China’s pull in clean technologies, even as it confronts the reality that deteriorating relations with the US may be “permanent,” Wopke Hoekstra, the bloc’s Commissioner for Climate, Net Zero and Clean Growth, claimed in an interview, according to Bloomberg on Thursday.

　　Hoekstra criticized moves by some of the EU’s close partners to deepen engagement with China, claiming that recent efforts by the UK and Canada to draw closer to Beijing were a “misstep” driven by Washington’s latest provocations, and adding that the EU would continue taking steps to reduce its reliance on Chinese technology.

　　Such remarks by the EU official amount to forcing climate change and clean energy – issues that should serve the shared interests of all humanity – into a geopolitical framework, a fundamental mistake that undermines Europe’s own climate efforts and the foundation of global cooperation, Li Yong, an executive council member of the China Society for WTO Studies, told the Global Times on Friday.