EU ‘suspends’ ratification of China investment deal after sanctions

Massive trade agreement stalls after tit-for-tat sanctions prompted by Chinese policy in Xinjiang

The European Commission has said that efforts to ratify a massive investment deal with China have been in effect suspended after tit-for-tat sanctions were imposed over China's treatment of its Uyghur population in March.

We now in a sense have suspended ... political outreach activities from the European Commission side," said the commission's executive vice-president, Valdis Dombrovskis, on Tuesday. He said that the current state of relations between Brussels and Beijing was not conducive" for the ratification of the deal, which is known as EU-China comprehensive agreement on investment.