Port of Hamburg: Cabinet allows limited Cosco entry

The government has approved a compromise in the dispute over the entry of the Chinese state shipping company Cosco in the port of Hamburg. The group can now participate with 24.9 percent – instead of 35 percent as originally planned.

The German government has approved the limited entry of the Chinese state shipping company Cosco into the operating company of a container terminal in the port of Hamburg. The cabinet agreed to a so-called partial ban.

No more manager posts planned

Instead of taking a 35 percent stake in the Tollerort terminal of the Hamburg port logistics group HHLA, the government only approved a 24.9 percent stake for the Chinese. HHLA is now trying to reach an agreement with Cosco for the slimmed-down entry, which also no longer provides for an entitlement to a managing director position. Cosco should also be prohibited from being granted contractual veto rights in strategic business or personnel decisions.

The decision was preceded by a conflict within the Federal Government between the Chancellery and a number of ministries, which had spoken out in favor of a complete ban. Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck and other federal ministers had warned of new dependencies, particularly after experiences with gas supplies from Russia.

Is the port a critical infrastructure – or not?

However, the Chancellery and the Hamburg government had pushed for the entry to take place. Scholz, who is traveling to China at the beginning of November, pointed out that the port was not being sold. If the cabinet had not decided this week, the sale would have been automatically approved as originally agreed between Cosco and HHLA.

The compromise, described in negotiating circles as an emergency solution, is now intended to allay concerns about excessive Chinese influence on the Port of Hamburg. According to the Foreign Trade and Payments Act, investments in critical infrastructure of 25 percent or more are subject to approval. Since the Tollerort terminal was not counted as part of the critical infrastructure, the ordered reduction to 24.9 percent resolved the internal government dispute. However, critics see the entire port operation as a critical infrastructure and therefore rejected the entry.

Merz: Reassessment of the relationship with China

The CDU chairman Friedrich Merz has now called for a fundamental reassessment of the relationship with China. After the start of the Russian war against Ukraine and the party congress of the Chinese Communist Party, the question was “whether we should continue to give such a country access to our really critical infrastructure,” Merz said ARD morning magazine.

“And for me, the focus is not primarily on financial aspects, but on political and strategic ones,” said Merz. Among other things, he referred to the warnings of the ministries and the Federal Intelligence Service to allow such an investment. It is about a fundamental aspect of Germany’s security interests. “I don’t understand how the chancellor can insist on granting such a permit in a situation like this,” said Merz.

Dröge: Nothing learned from Russia policy

The Greens parliamentary group leader Katharina Dröge has also criticized the decision as a mistake. Although the compromise limits the damage, it continues to lead to economic dependency and impairs Germany’s sovereignty in critical infrastructure. Dröge continued: “Those who glorify this investment as a purely economic project have learned nothing from the Russia policy of the past decades. When it comes to critical infrastructure and key technologies, there must be no dependence on authoritarian and undemocratic states.”

Like Merz, Dröge called for a new China policy. This also includes “a further development of the foreign trade law and an agreement in the EU on a common infrastructure strategy”.

Eight terminal holdings in Europe

Cosco also operates the world’s fourth largest container shipping company. Their ships have been calling at the Tollerort terminal for more than 40 years. In return for the stake, Cosco wants to make the terminal a preferred transhipment point in Europe. Shipping company shares in terminals are common in global container logistics. Cosco itself already holds shares in eight terminals in Europe alone.