Who Holds the Levers
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is in China again this week, his fourth trip in just over three years to the world’s second-largest economy, as Spain seeks to strengthen its political and commercial ties with Beijing. Sánchez began the visit on Monday, April 13, 2026, and is in China through Wednesday. He is set to meet Tuesday with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Premier Li Qiang and China’s top lawmaker, Zhao Leji, the third-ranking leader of its ruling Communist Party.
The itinerary lays out the hierarchy plainly: one head of government traveling to meet the top figures of another state and its ruling party, while ordinary people are left to absorb the consequences of decisions made in those rooms. Spain says it wants to diversify its political relations with the world’s large powers, including Beijing, while Spanish officials have said the government wants to shore up more Chinese investment and boost exports to China.
What the Powerful Call “Partnership”
On Monday, Sánchez urged China to assume a larger role in a multipolar world, speaking at Beijing’s Tsinghua University a day before he is set to meet with Xi. He said, “China can do more. For example, by demanding ... that international law be respected and that the conflicts in Lebanon, Iran, Gaza and the West Bank and Ukraine cease,” and later said, “We need China to do the same. To open up so that Europe doesn’t have to close itself off.”
He also encouraged China to play a larger role alongside the EU to fight climate change, promote global health and control the development of responsible artificial intelligence as well as nuclear weapons. Sánchez said, “Especially now that the U.S. has decided to withdraw from many of these fronts.” The language is diplomatic, but the structure is familiar: states negotiating over influence, while the people living through war, sanctions, trade gaps and energy transitions remain the ones expected to pay.
The visit comes at a complex geopolitical moment as European leaders try to influence an end to the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran, and as Spain’s relationship with the U.S. has been strained by Sánchez’s vocal disapproval of the conflict. Spain says it wants to diversify its political relations with the world’s large powers, including Beijing. That is the reformist script of the system: shift alliances, rebalance the board, keep the board.
Who Pays for the Deals
The southern European nation, which generates more than half its electricity from renewable sources, needs Chinese critical raw materials, solar panels and green technologies, similar to other European countries transitioning away from fossil fuels. The dependency is not abstract. Spain’s government is seeking Chinese investment and exports while trade policy is conducted by the European Union on behalf of all 27 member states.
Spain, the eurozone’s fourth-largest economy, has been less adversarial toward China than other EU countries in recent years. It has sought to reposition trade relations with China, whose exports to Spain are far greater than those of the Iberian nation of 49 million people. Sánchez’s government has had little success, with China accounting for about 74% of Spain’s overall trade gap.
Politically, the trip comes as Spain has stuck its neck out in Europe as the continent’s loudest critic of the U.S. and Israel’s military actions in the Middle East, with the Sánchez government recently declaring its airspace closed to U.S. planes being used in the Iran war, and refusing the U.S. the use of jointly operated military bases in southern Spain. The state’s maneuvering over airspace, bases and trade shows how ordinary people are governed through decisions made far above them, with military and commercial priorities set by institutions that do not answer to them.
Eric Sigmon, a Madrid-based political analyst and a former U.S. national security adviser, said, “Given the increased frictions with the U.S. administration, these annual meetings have taken on an increased importance,” about Sánchez’s latest trip to China. Alicia García-Herrero, chief economist for Asia Pacific at the French investment bank Natixis, said, “This repeated annual pilgrimage by Sánchez — his fourth in four (calendar) years — highlights an increasingly one-sided and unbalanced relationship.” She said China serves as “a relatively soft, conciliatory partner” that advocates for dialogue over tougher EU measures.
Spain’s King Felipe VI also made an official visit to China last November, the first time in 18 years that a Spanish monarch did so, demonstrating the nation’s interest in bolstering its relationship with Beijing. Sánchez’s last visit to Beijing ruffled feathers in Washington and took place shortly after the Trump administration announced sweeping global tariffs. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent at the time warned Spain about “cutting your own throat.”