BEIJING (Reuters) – China is willing to work with Germany on the economic and trade fronts, and the two countries are partners, not adversaries, its foreign minister, Qin Gang, said on Friday.

Qin, addressing a joint news conference with his German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, said artificially putting the brakes on normal economic and trade cooperation would be counter-productive.

Remarking on the situation with Taiwan, Qin said if countries want to respect the One-China principle, then the proper move is to resolutely oppose Taiwan independence.

China recently had military drills around Taiwan, saying they had tested integrated military capabilities under actual combat conditions, having practised precision strikes and blockading the island that Beijing views as its own.

On the issue of Ukraine, Qin said China was willing to continue to work for peace and hoped that all parties involved in the crisis would remain objective and calm and work together.

“One point I want to emphasise is that China’s role in the Ukraine issue, our proposition, boils down to one point, that is, to persuade and promote talks, and we will not do anything to add fuel to the fire,” Qin said.