To those who thought the war in Ukraine would undermine the “limitless” partnership between China and Russia, Xi Jinping showed the opposite during his visit to his “friend” Vladimir Putin last week. In fact, the Chinese communist regime has steadily moved closer to its neighbor for the past nine years. And it will continue to do so, even if the economic imbalance continues to grow between the two countries, because this movement is part of a long-term strategic objective, explains Alice Ekman, analyst in charge of Asia and of China at the Institute for Security Studies of the European Union and author of “Last flight to Beijing – Essay on the dissociation of worlds” (Editions de l’Observatoire). More generally, continues the sinologist, Beijing seeks to create a coalition of countries to marginalize the West and discredit its political system. Interview.
L’Express: Nearly a year after the start of the war in Ukraine, which is ravaging the country and the lives of civilians, Xi Jinping has still not condemned Russian aggression. Visiting Moscow a few days after Vladimir Putin received a International Criminal Court arrest warrant, the Chinese president has never ceased to stage his friendship with his Russian counterpart, his faith in this strategic partnership and his distrust of the West. At the risk of further tarnishing its image in the West. What is his long-term goal?
Alice Ekman: The rapprochement with Russia, which began nine years ago, is part of a long-term strategy and in a context of strong and prolonged tensions between China and the United States; and, more broadly, between on the one hand a group of countries including China and Russia, and on the other a group of so-called “Western” countries. Since the start of the war, China has not distanced itself from its strategic partner. On the contrary, the bilateral relationship has been consolidated on several levels.
On the commercial level first of all, since the total volume of trade between the two countries increased in 2022 by nearly 30% over one year, compared to 2021 – according to Chinese customs figures published in mid-January. In parallel, the two countries have continued to conduct joint military exercises: in the East China Sea at the end of 2022, off the South African coast in February (also with South Africa), off the Gulf of Oman (also with Iran) in March. On the diplomatic level, finally, China has done everything to prevent Russia from becoming a pariah state, by multiplying high-level bilateral exchanges since the beginning of the war, by cooperating with it within the G20, the BRICS and others. multilateral fora. In April 2022, China unsuccessfully opposed Russia’s suspension from the UN Human Rights Council.
In reality, Sino-Russian rapprochement has been underestimated for nine years. In 2014, after the annexation of Crimea, when Russia turned to China by signing important energy agreements with it, some spoke of pragmatic and short-term cooperation. The bilateral relationship was often referred to as a simple “marriage of convenience”. This was to forget both the range of sectors of cooperation between the two countries (energy, but also military, space, diplomatic, etc.), and the deeper motivations that bring the two countries together – and first and foremost their strong resentment against this which they call the “West”.
In receiving Xi in Moscow, Putin showed unusual deference. In fact, China has continued to increase its ascendancy over its neighbour. What benefits can China derive from this situation?
There are pragmatic benefits: the signing of new energy contracts, with preferential rates negotiated in yuan, to circumvent the dollar. But China is smart enough to show sufficient signs of consideration to Russia. Since 2013, for example, it has continued to reassure Russia about the new Silk Roads, telling it that it is not a competing project. The Chinese ascendancy has certainly strengthened, but China has every interest in not humiliating Russia. It considers its relationship with Russia to be a priority, strategic and long-term.
Isn’t the imbalance all the same likely to weaken the partnership?
Today it is fashionable to speak of “the vassalization of Russia by China”. The expression disturbs me, because it can imply that the Sino-Russian rapprochement is not tenable – which was already affirmed 9 years ago and which turned out to be false. Moreover, it does not take into account the fact that in its communication, China spares Russia.
Moreover, China is aware that Russia is a member of the UN Security Council, that it is a nuclear military power – despite the limits that we currently see in Ukraine – but also a diplomatic power, space, and in terms of propaganda.
Of course, there is an economic imbalance between the second and the eleventh world economy. But that did not prevent – and still does not prevent – the gradual consolidation of the rapprochement because the long-term objective is political, ideological and geostrategic.
What does it consist on ?
On the political level, during Xi Jinping’s visit to Moscow, Vladimir Putin once again congratulated his Chinese counterpart on his “re-election” for a third term. For his part, Xi Jinping already publicly anticipates that Vladimir Putin will remain in power after 2024. The two countries condemn what they call “color revolutions” – a term to which the two leaders again referred during their meeting -, fomented, according to them, throughout the world by Westerners, and oppose regime change in the broad sense. Xi Jinping’s visit to Russia has cemented mutual political support between the two countries in the face of what he sees as the Western threat. On a geostrategic level, they both condemn the existence of the Aukus (the military cooperation agreement between the United States, Australia and Great Britain) and NATO – and have expressed concern by its growing presence in Asia. More broadly, both share a very strong desire to challenge the West. The existence of a common enemy, but above all the will to create together a new world order within which this enemy would be marginalized, constitutes the driving force of Sino-Russian rapprochement.
Beyond the great declarations of friendship, did Xi’s visit to Putin lead to a concrete strengthening of cooperation between the two countries?
In my opinion, it was above all a State visit which included a strong political dimension. But we also note the consolidation of cooperation in traditional sectors (energy in the first place, agriculture), and the acceleration of diversification into other sectors (automotive, finance/new payment systems, logistics, among others). The two countries notably announced the strengthening of ties between the Chinese New Silk Roads project and the Russian project of the Eurasian Economic Union, and more broadly the strengthening of cooperation in Central Asia. This axis of cooperation is to be followed – to see if it is only a simple announcement or if it will actually be followed by new concrete projects for transport or telecommunications infrastructure in the region.
Does China nevertheless have reservations about its neighbor?
Obviously, China did not appreciate having to evacuate more than 6,000 nationals from Ukrainian territory quickly in the context of war. And Ukraine was an interesting partner for her, particularly in agriculture. China certainly does not welcome this war, but it does nothing to condemn it. She prefers to continue to support Vladimir Putin’s Russia, because there are many more issues that bring them together than issues that divide them.
China is getting closer to Russia but also to Iran and Saudi Arabia, while defending the security concerns of North Korea and virulently criticizing Western democracies. Are we witnessing a rapprochement of authoritarian regimes face to face with the West under the aegis of China?
China is certainly in a coalition strategy that addresses the so-called “developing” countries in the first place, and seeks to marginalize the West. That is no longer in doubt. It thus hopes to weaken, in multilateral forums, opposition on sensitive issues. In fact, the countries that support China’s positions on Xinjiang, Hong Kong and other human rights issues at the United Nations are mostly non-Western and non-democratic states.
The will to marginalize the West is also exercised in the field of ideas. The Chinese Communist Party considers that to stay in power, it is necessary to fight against the penetration of ideas and criticisms considered politically hostile on the national territory; but also to oppose more systematically and with more virulence the influence of democratic and liberal ideals in the world. It does so, alongside Russia, by advocating relativism: there would be no universal values, China and Russia would be “democratic” and other forms of democracy would not be “superior” to theirs – it is what the two leaders said during their meeting in Moscow. This relativism was already defended in the joint press release of February 4, 2022, published at the end of Vladimir Putin’s visit to Beijing, on the occasion of the Winter Olympics.
What threat does this trend pose to Western democracies?
It is a threat in the sense that China has the ambition to promote an alternative political and security model, and especially in the sense that it gives itself the means for this ambition. She has been promoting this ambition with more activism since China’s post-Covid reopening in recent months. A recent example among others of this activism: the Chinese government announced last month that it would offer training programs to 5,000 foreign police and military – exclusively from so-called “developing” countries – in the next five years.
If China provides authoritarian regimes with the means – human, technological – to stay in place, then it obviously contributes to strengthening them. In this context, democracies could be further threatened, not only because they face a risk of marginalization in multilateral forums, but also a risk of weakening on their own territory. When China and Russia develop propaganda strategies that aim to constantly criticize the West, to highlight the weaknesses of its political system, and even to create internal divisions, particularly in an electoral context, this has consequences – especially in the countries who do not have the means to protect themselves against it, or who simply have not grasped the reality of the threat.
In China, anti-American and anti-Western discourse is becoming increasingly virulent. While in Washington, there is a bipartisan consensus that China is public enemy number one. In this climate, aren’t tensions likely to continue to worsen?
Of course. The speeches are indeed more and more Manichean. Anti-Western communication has reached a level of violence in China not seen since the Maoist era. We are witnessing a polarization of the world which is worrying in the sense that it is not only a competition of economic or diplomatic influence, it is a competition of norms, values, political systems. China considers that for too long the West has humiliated it, crushed its influence in multilateral organizations, and that it is time to silence it, and to fight back. This resentment runs deep within the Chinese Communist Party. The positioning of “wolf wolves” diplomacy, which since 2019 specifically targets Western countries – including European Union countries – is still in progress, and has already left its mark. And it will be difficult to go back to a time when the codes of diplomatic communication were respected.