Germany's Merz proposes wider EU-Asia market access to counter trade restrictions

By Andreas Rinke

SINGAPORE, Oct 27 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called on Tuesday for European and Asian middle powers to build a strategic alliance in trade, technology and security, warning that an erosion of the established global order threatened their shared interests.

"We stand on the threshold of a new geopolitical era," Merz said in a keynote speech at Singapore's ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute, on the first stop of a week-long Asia trip that will also take him to Japan and South Korea. 

"Our freedom, our sovereignty, our security and our prosperity are at stake," Merz said, pitching for closer cooperation between mid-sized powers in Europe and Asia.

Merz proposed an interregional agreement with members of the  12-nation Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, that includes Japan, Britain, Canada and Singapore. Together with the EU, these partners "account for more than a third of global trade," he said.

The German chancellor described the push for closer Europe-Asia ties as "long-term and strategic in nature" and said it was "one of our most important responses to the new era".     

CHINA POLICY "COMING OF AGE"

Merz said Germany's policy towards China was "coming of age" and was aligned with the European Union. 

He warned against full economic decoupling from China, calling it "a mistake" that "would make us neither safe nor more prosperous." Instead, he said, Europe and Asia must reduce "unhealthy, one-sided dependencies" in supply chains, technologies and raw materials. 

But where trade competition was "distorted due to systemic overcapacity or restrictions on exports and market access, remedies are needed," Merz said. 

EU ministers last week called for deals with Beijing to curb imports across sectors including chemicals and machinery, to address a goods trade deficit that has swelled to more than €1 billion ($1.1 billion) a day. 

($1 = 0.8961 euros)

(Reporting by Andreas Rinke and Xinghui Kok; Writing by Kirsti Knolle; Editing by David Stanway and Sharon Singleton)