The Group of the European People's Party, which with its 185 MEPs is the main political group in Parliament considers that European ports can no longer be treated as neutral trading spaces and that the EU can no longer accept that foreign governments and state-owned companies can invest and hold stakes in some of Europe's most strategic. In a note, the EPP Group points out that 'in a Europe we are allowing foreign states to keep the keys of our front door - our ports - checking access to the doors of our economies". "We have granted to external actors - it is underlined - direct access to the our critical infrastructures. China is an example of the at stake. Beijing's top three port investors - the state-owned companies COSCO and China Merchants Ports and CK Hutchison, based in Hong Kong - hold minority or majority stakes in around 30 EU port terminals. These include terminals of the busiest ports in the EU: Rotterdam, Antwerp-Bruges and Hamburg".

According to the EPP Group, 'to avoid the 'waterbed effect", a European approach is needed. È now - the note specifies - to stop being naïve: in a increasingly competitive geopolitical environment, the dependence of foreign investment in critical infrastructure raises serious questions about security, transparency and resilience. However, it's not just about geopolitics. Ports with poor surveillance are ports where criminal networks thrive. Europe is already the largest cocaine market and most of them arrive by sea, right through the terminal of which we are losing control. Right now - specifies the note referring to the "water mattress" effect - stricter controls in a port do nothing but Move the issues to another. We need better cooperation, information sharing and action to prevent criminal networks from exploiting our ports. Non-transparent management of ports is also a risk for public safety".

EPP Group welcomes the strategy for ports presented last March by the European Commission ( of 4 March 2026), highlighting that this strategy "passes through the finally to the next level and address security issues which, until now, have been absent from European port policy" and "rightly focuses on the risks related to property and on ensuring that Member States can guarantee access and operational control".

"The real vulnerabilities - continues the note - are not they only affect those who own the terminals. They concern those who controls, who manages the data and who provides the software, and hardware. China is a clear example of how these levels can create risks: combine commercial expansion with intelligence, coercion, espionage, sabotage and even military logistics, demonstrating how influence can extend far beyond formal ownership. We must ensure that our ports remain absolutely safe, preventing additional foreign ownership and excluding foreign actors from operational control. The risk of disruption of our imports and exports is too large; there is no time to lose".

Specifying that the goal, moreover, is that the ports remain competitive, the EPP Group makes it clear that The proposed approach "does not mean turning our backs on the investments. If adequately screened - it is specified - they can to help modernise our ports and create jobs for work. The goal is not to close down, but to ensure that openness must never be at the expense of our independence".

The note also stresses the importance of having a "brake ", providing European governments with a clear legal mechanism to quickly regain control of ports in the event that a foreign state were to use control over European ports to exert political pressure on Europe.

"We have learned a brutal lesson from our dependence on Russian gas. Prices have risen. The Families have struggled to pay their heating bills. Not We can continue to fall into the same traps. Our ports they are the gates of Europe, so let's stop giving away the keys."