This will be the first state visit to Russia in nearly four years. Chinese President Xi Jinping will be in Moscow from March 20 to 22 to discuss their “strategic cooperation” with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Officially neutral, China continues to strengthen its ties with Russia, despite the war in Ukraine, which it has refused to condemn. As Zhao Tong, a researcher at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, explains to L’Express, Beijing keeps its opposition to the United States as a strategic priority.
L’Express: Why is the “friendship” between the Russian and Chinese regimes maintained despite the war?
Zhao Tong: China and Russia share the same reading, the same vision of world affairs. Despite the war in Ukraine, the international community should not expect much change in China’s position vis-à-vis Russia, which it will not abandon to improve its relations with Western countries. Quite simply because China considers Russia as its teammate against the United States.
Why can’t China afford a collapse of Putin’s regime?
It must be understood that the Chinese perception of the war is that the United States and Western countries are using this conflict to weaken Russia. For China, this is the fundamental objective of the Americans. She fears that once Russia is defeated, they will target China and apply similar pressure to contain its development.
She also fears that a Russian defeat will lead to the replacement of Vladimir Putin by pro-Western leaders, ready to change Russia’s strategic positioning in favor of the United States. It would shift the current balance of power internationally to the detriment of China, which it sees as the biggest long-term threat.
However, what benefits can China draw from the weakening of Putin’s regime?
She tries to make the most of the situation. A weakened Russia will depend more on China, with more favorable access to Russian oil and gas. It will also have more weight in the Russian-Chinese bilateral relationship. Some nationalists imagine that this will allow him to expand his influence in the eastern part of Russia, where there are territories that China has controlled in the past. However, China thinks above all that a weakened Russia would be especially less useful to counter the influence of the United States.
Will this also allow her to get her hands on certain Russian technologies?
It will be increasingly difficult for a weakened Russia to deny some of China’s demands for sensitive technologies on which the Russians are ahead. Some are of great interest to Beijing, be it the motorization of aircraft, or submarine and nuclear engineering.
In addition to the trip to Moscow, Xi Jinping could take Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the phone. A first since the invasion…
Such a diplomatic gesture would make it possible to counterbalance the visit of the Chinese president to his Russian counterpart. Because this meeting will not be good for the image of China at the international level. She has already tried to reduce the negative impact of her positioning with a 12-point document about the war in Ukraine. But this is not a roadmap to solving it. It seems unlikely that China can get a halt to the war in the short term. Its priority is its international image. She wants to appear as a leader in the promotion of peace.
And in the long term, could China play a leading role in ending the war?
It will be up to Ukraine and Russia to decide when and how they want to end the war and the possible concessions to redraw the borders. Maybe China can play a role then. Perhaps she is waiting until both sides are exhausted from intense fighting and no longer have the ability to make progress on the battlefield. In this case, Beijing would be in a good position to mediate and negotiate a ceasefire. But let’s not forget that so far Xi has had no influence on Putin’s obsession with conquering Ukrainian territory.