appropriate taxation. In early 2015, Gabriel and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron wrote in a joint letter to Vice-President of the European Commission Andrus Ansip that the growing power of some online giants “warrants a policy consultation with the aim of establishing an appropriate general regulatory framework for ‘essential digital platforms.’” In 2016, during a series of Chinese bids for German engineering firms, Gabriel publicly called for a European-wide safeguard clause which could stop foreign takeovers of firms whose technology is deemed strategic for the future economic success of the region. Human rights In April 2014, human rights lawyer Mo Shaoping was blocked from meeting Gabriel during his visit to China, despite the minister saying ahead of the meeting that he wanted to meet critical voices. During a 2015 visit to King Salman of Saudi Arabia, Gabriel launched an unusual public effort to persuade Saudi authorities to free imprisoned writer Raif Badawi and grant him clemency, amplifying Germany’s political voice in a region in which its influence had largely been limited to economic issues in years past. He had been urged by MPs and human rights organizations to take up Badawi's case before his trip. His outspoken criticism of Saudi justice was unusual for Western leaders visiting the country, a close ally for the West in fighting terrorism and Islamic State militants, particularly given Germany’s status as Saudi Arabia’s third-largest source of imports. While the U.S. State Department had previously also criticized the Badawi sentence, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry did not talk about the case publicly when he visited Riyadh only days before. During a subsequent trip to Qatar, Gabriel called on the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani and other senior officials to do better in protecting foreign household workers who face abuse from their employers. Controversy Thilo Sarrazin In 2010, Gabriel called the speeches of Thilo Sarrazin, his party colleague who wrote critically about immigration by accusing Muslims of refusing to integrate and of “dumbing down” German society, "verbal violence". He stated that although Sarrazin described many things that were accurate, his conclusions did not fit into the egalitarian “ideals” of Social Democracy anymore. Kaiser’s takeover In 2016, a German court nullified Gabriel's controversial decision to grant a special permission for the country's biggest supermarket chain Edeka to buy grocery store chain Kaiser's, owned by Tengelmann Group. The judges raised questions about the