In a way, it was the Dalai Lama and former French President Nicolas Sarkozy who got Professor Andreas Fuchs involved with China. The 2008 meeting between the Tibetan leader and the then EU Council president caused dissonance between the EU and China. „The political tensions were so present that Chinese people in my circle of acquaintances in Paris turned down job offers in France and returned home,“ Andreas Fuchs says, looking back. „That was one of the moments when I realized that with China, we not only have an emerging world power but that political relations and business are particularly closely intertwined here.“ Interest was piqued.