The Danish Embassy in Beijing hosted a panel discussion Friday 2 March. The event was organized by the Foreign Correspondents Club China with guest from the foreign media and other Embassies in Beijing.
During the event the Danish Ambassador Friis Arne Petersen, Carmen Cano de Lasala, Deputy Head of the EU, together with Jonas Parello-Plesner from the European Council on Foreign Relations and Hans Kundnani, editorial director at the European Council on Foreign Relations, debated and took questions on the event topic: ‘China and Germany’s scrabble for a Europe in crisis’ and perspectives on relations between China and Europe.
ABOUT THE PANELISTS:
Before his posting to Beijing, Friis Arne Petersen was Ambassador of Denmark to the United States. He holds a Master Degree in economics from University of Copenhagen and lectures and writes frequently on foreign policy.
Carmen Cano de Lasala, currently the Deputy Head of the EU Delegation to The People’s Republic of China, and previously the Deputy Director General of Continental Asia with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Spain, served from 2006-2010 as Counsellor for Political Affairs and head of the Cultural Department at the Spanish Embassy in China. She has also held government posts for Spain while in Romania, Ghana, and Ethiopia.
Jonas Parello-Plesner is a Senior Policy Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He previously served as Denmark’s Senior Advisor on China and North East Asia from 2005-2009.
Hans Kundnani is editorial director at the European Council on Foreign Relations, joining in November 2009. Prior to this position, he was a journalist and continues to write for publications including The Guardian, The Observer, Financial Times, Prospect and the Times Literary Supplement. He is the author of the book Utopia or Auschwitz. Germany’s 1968 Generation and the Holocaust (London/New York, 2009).
