Peter Szijjarto the Foreign Minister of Hungary, is warning that any move to reduce the EU’s ties with China could be disastrous for the bloc, given the direct foreign investments China makes in EU countries, as well as the fact that China has emerged as a strategic trade partner for so many EU nations.

On Tuesday, in an interview with CNBC at the World Economic Forum’s annual conference in Tianjin, China, he warned that it would be “suicide” for the EU economy, if the EU were to pursue a policy of “decoupling” and “de-risking,” with China.

Szijjarto asked, “How could you decouple without killing the European economy?”

His warning comes as Washington is pushing allies to begin taking a harder line on China, by limiting technology transfers and containing its economic opportunities with other nations, and the EU is looking to navigate a path which will maintain its relations with China without upsetting Washington.

Although the Untied States is the biggest trade partner of the European Union, China was the lead exporter to Europe, as well as the third-biggest buyer of EU products

Szijjarto noted that Hungary has no reason to treat China as a threat, and has no reason to engage in “de-risking,” which was a term coined by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in a March speech which called on Europe to diminish its dependence on Chinese trade.

He went on, “We look at China as a country with which, if you cooperate, you can take a lot of benefit out of it.”

Szijarto noted the political atmosphere in Europe is “very ideological, very emotional,” and warned that European leaders need to be more rational, and recognize that treating China as a rival is futile.

He said, “It’s obvious that if you want to compete with China, if you want to look at China as a rival to us, then we Europeans will lose. Why don’t we come back to the basis of rationality, common sense, reality and pragmatism, and why don’t we start to make an even closer relationship with China than before.”