German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who is currently visiting China, shares two posts on Instagram on February 26, 2026. This image, the cover of one post, shows him waving to a robot from Unitree Robotics. Photo: Screenshot from Merz's Instagram account

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who is currently visiting China, shared two posts on Instagram on Thursday evening, with captions referring to the Chinese Year of the Fire Horse, writing that it "stands for energy and strength." "I hope it will be a year of growth and economic cooperation between Germany and China," he added.

One post features a roughly one-minute-long video documenting his activities over the past two days, while the other is a six-photo gallery focusing on visits to local companies. The captions express his expectations for economic cooperation between China and Germany.

The video, titled "Visit to China - a fair partnership on equal footing," opens with footage from a welcome banquet, where Merz is seen smiling broadly and saying, "I am a very, very, very big friend of Chinese dishes." It also shows him walking past a Chinese honor guard and attending a media event in front of traditional Chinese-style architecture.

According to the Xinhua News Agency reports, Merz was accompanied by a large delegation of German business representatives on his China visit. About 30 senior executives from leading German companies in sectors such as automotive, chemicals, biopharma, machinery manufacturing, and circular economy accompanied the trip, underscoring Germany's strong intent to deepen practical cooperation with China, per Xinhua.

Merz's latest post was a photo gallery of six images. The cover photo shows him waving to a robot from Unitree Robotics, with the company's founder Wang Xingxing standing nearby and providing explanations. Four of the photos document Merz's visit to Unitree Robotics: He is seen standing with arms folded and head slightly bowed, intently watching humanoid robots engage in a boxing match; in another image, taken from behind, he observes the Spring Festival Gala-featured "WuBot" - the robot martial arts performance - performing a backflip; in a third, he watches humanoid robots and robot dogs cooperate to transport packages, with Merz leaning forward, hands in his pockets, to examine the process closely.

The remaining two photos show Merz experiencing new vehicle models from Mercedes-Benz. "German companies are active in China, and many Chinese firms are interested in Germany," he wrote in the caption accompanying the photo gallery.

Notably, Merz used a total of 37 German words in the caption to describe what he saw during his visits to companies on Thursday, with more than half of the text devoted to his impressions of Unitree Robotics. "Unitree Robotics showed me highly intelligent robots that support, among other things, factories, households and firefighting," he said.

This is Merz's first official visit to China since taking office. He is also the first foreign leader China has received in the Year of the Horse. In recent remarks, Merz has at times invoked the imagery of the Horse in Chinese culture, and drawn on horse-related idioms to frame his expectations for the year and for China-Germany cooperation.

Global Times