In its 20th package of sanctions against Russia, the European Union has once again included multiple Chinese entities, seemingly convinced that if one keeps adding names to lists, geopolitics will eventually turn in one's favor.

The package, formally approved on Thursday, broadens measures against Russia's energy, finance and trade sectors, while also targeting companies in third countries that the EU claims have helped Moscow's military.

After 20 rounds of sanctions, the bloc should ask itself an inconvenient question: If sanctions are the answer, why does the Ukraine crisis continue?

This is the awkward truth no one in the Berlaymont likes to discuss. After 20 rounds, its sanctions have become performance art with paperwork.

Beijing firmly opposes the EU's unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction.

China's response has been swift. Shortly after the EU adopted the sanctions list, in a fully justified move, China's Ministry of Commerce added seven EU entities to its export control list to safeguard national security and interests and fulfill the country's international nonproliferation obligations.

Overseas organizations and individuals are prohibited from transferring or providing dual-use items originating in China to these entities. Any related activities currently underway must be halted immediately, the ministry said.

The EU should realize that disputes should be handled under international law and through the United Nations framework, not by extending domestic preferences across borders like imperial tape measures.

China has recently strengthened its legal toolbox against extraterritorial measures that harm Chinese interests. The new regulations and mechanisms are designed to make the country's countermeasures faster to implement, more precise and more enforceable. So if the EU insists on exporting its sanctions logic into Chinese commercial space, Beijing is prepared to invoice it for the inconvenience.

The EU says it wants "de-risking", not "decoupling". Yet every time it reflexively reaches for sanctions against Chinese companies, it nudges reality closer to "decoupling".

In the latest show of that, the EU and the United States signed an agreement on Friday to coordinate the supply of critical minerals needed for key industries, with China reportedly being the potential target.

One cannot court Chinese investment, seek stable supply chains and lament weak growth, while simultaneously sanctioning Chinese companies for political purposes.

There is also a larger strategic comedy here.

The Ukraine crisis is Europe's largest security emergency in decades, yet when serious conversations about ending it begin, the EU often finds itself peering through the restaurant window at Washington and others discussing a menu that includes itself. Europe is paying an enormous cost — yet is struggling to secure a decisive seat at the negotiating table.

That should prompt introspection.

China has consistently called for a ceasefire, dialogue and a political settlement of the Ukraine crisis. Beijing's position papers and diplomatic messaging emphasize indivisible security, opposition to bloc confrontation and the need to address root causes rather than merely symptoms.

As China's foreign minister noted in Munich in February, sustainable peace in Europe requires a balanced, effective and durable security architecture — not perpetual escalation dressed up as principle.

The EU should recognize a basic fact: China is not the one prolonging the battle. China advocates talks. And talks, eventually, are how wars end.

There is a fashionable tendency in some European circles to wrongly see China through the prism of suspicion. It is a narrow lens that distorts rather than reveals: The country is viewed as a rival, risk, challenge and threat. Whereas in actuality, China is Europe's major trading partner, a technological actor, a market, a diplomatic force, and yes, a major contributor to peace.

Rational policy requires looking at what is happening with binocular vision, not an ideological monocle.

The EU's interests would be better served if it viewed China objectively and stabilized economic ties. Instead, it too often blows the way of Washington's wind and calls it "strategic autonomy".

The Ukraine crisis will end when diplomacy becomes louder than virtue-signaling. The EU once excelled at diplomacy. It should try to remember that now.

- Li Yang, China Daily