Europe is getting twitchy about who owns its ports, with mounting anxiety driven by the outsized footprint of Chinese firms across the bloc’s maritime gateways.
Transport Commissioner Apostolos Tzitzikostas on Thursday told industry leaders that Europe’s ports must “reconsider security … and examine foreign presence more carefully.” It was one of the clearest signals yet from Brussels that what once was seen as a benign investment is now starting to look like a security liability.
The Commission’s recent defense white paper echoed that concern by floating the idea of stricter controls on foreign ownership of “critical transport infrastructure.”
That unease is mirrored in a draft paper from the Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, seen by POLITICO, which calls for tougher rules in the upcoming overhaul of the EU’s foreign investment screening regulation.
Neither Tzitzikostas nor the S&D mentioned China by name, but the subtext wasn’t exactly subtle. Simon Van Hoeymissen, a researcher at Belgium’s Royal Higher Institute for Defense, said the language likely nods to Beijing’s expanding hold over key European ports — from Antwerp-Bruges and Rotterdam to Piraeus in Greece.
Chinese giants COSCO and China Merchants, as well as Hong Kong-based Hutchison now hold stakes in more than 30 terminals across the EU.
“The reality is clear,” said Ana Miguel Pedro, a Portuguese MEP with the center-right European People’s Party. A member of the Parliament’s Seas, Rivers, Islands & Coastal Areas Intergroup, she warned that “foreign state-driven actors like Beijing are operating with a level of coordination and intent that far exceeds the fragmented response of individual countries.”
Pedro argued COSCO isn’t behaving like a typical market actor but is taking orders from the Chinese Communist Party. “Its growing presence in ports is not just an economic concern,” she said. “It’s a strategic vulnerability.”
The EU is starting to see it that way, too.
“Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s unofficial support for Russia have only heightened concerns about the security of the EU’s ports,” says a recent report from the Warsaw-based Centre for Eastern Studies think tank.
One example of the kind of strategic entanglement the EU is now confronting is playing out in Poland, at the Gdynia Container Terminal, where Hutchison has held a stake for over 20 years.
That situation could change. Under pressure from U.S. President Donald Trump, who wants Chinese-linked companies out of the Panama Canal, Hutchison is negotiating a $23 billion sale of port properties worldwide, including 14 in Europe, to a consortium led by BlackRock and including Mediterranean Shipping Company. However, that deal hit a wall in March after Beijing intervened.
What makes Gdynia especially revealing isn’t just the trade it handles — it’s what sits next door: a naval base, a shipyard, and the headquarters of Poland’s elite naval special forces, meaning that whoever runs the terminal holds a front-row seat to European and NATO military logistics and defense operations.
Recognizing the strategic significance, the Polish government has listed the terminal as critical infrastructure, meaning the operator has to work closely with the government on security.
This high-stakes backdrop sharpens the edge of Pedro’s warning — and underscores why the EU is now reassessing foreign involvement in its ports with renewed urgency.
“If a foreign adversary exploits a vulnerability in one European port, it jeopardizes all of us,” she said. “In today’s world, we cannot afford strategic blindness while others act with full visibility and intent.”
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