In Uzbekistan, a dozen heads of state will line up for a regional security summit in the coming days: all are eager to have a chat with Chinese President Xi Jinping. In the West, during Xi’s first foreign visit since the outbreak of the pandemic, all the focus is on that one moment when Xi speaks to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
After all, with their last meeting in February, the gentlemen wrote history by entering into a far-reaching partnership. A few weeks later, Putin invaded Ukraine. Partly under the influence of that war, a strong authoritarian power bloc has been erected in the Far East. It is in both Putin’s and Xi’s interest to showcase their unity as a robust success. Hence, Xi, who has been conducting his foreign policy by telephone or video connection for nearly a thousand days, is boarding a plane for his Russian ‘partner without limits’.
Xi is brimming with confidence. On the eve of the Party Congress, where he is seeking an unusual third term, he sees no need to stay home to make political deals or thwart Communist Party scheming. Apparently Xi is not worried about his position of power, because after a state visit to Kazakhstan, he is going to Uzbekistan for a meeting with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). This is a security council of Central Asian countries and Russia set up by China, which also includes Pakistan, India and Iran.
Xi’s hobbyhorse
Xi sees himself as the man who stands up to the liberal-democratic West, the United States leading the way. That image is reinforced by Putin, who is putting the West at risk with a war. Putin is also neatly aligning himself with Xi’s pet peeve about Asia, which, under China’s leadership, is next in line to lead the world.
With that Russian turn to Asia, it looks like Xi has already accomplished his dreamed-up world order. Putin recently made a name for himself by supporting Xi’s Taiwan policy. The Russian and Chinese foreign ministers even marched out of the room together as a regional meeting of Asian countries criticized China’s display of military power around Taiwan amid escalating tensions with the US. That bodes well for the coming months, when Xi and Putin meet each other at international meetings such as the G-20.
There are vague signs that China is looking to intensify cooperation with Russia. During the preparatory work for the summit by Xi’s third husband Li Zhanshu, according to the Russian reading, Li expressed “understanding” for Russian “measures to protect core interests” and offered Chinese “assistance” in doing so. If Li actually said that – the Chinese state media is silent – it is the strongest Chinese support for Putin’s war in Ukraine to date.
Beijing tacitly supports Russia, but adheres to international sanctions against Russia, because China has already had enough of US sanctions against high-tech industry and state-owned companies. More sanctions in the form of secondary sanctions are causing additional turmoil in trade relations with Europe and the US, which is bad for the ailing Chinese economy. The sharply increased Sino-Russian trade is worth $146.8 billion this year, but that is a pittance compared to what is going on between China and the US and Europe.
Shot for open goal
Like Indonesia and India, China is eager to buy Russian oil and gas. Recently, gas supplies have been settled in Chinese renminbi or Russian rubles instead of dollars. This is useful in view of yet another new gas pipeline, which will pump fifty billion cubic meters of gas a year to China via Mongolia. The Power of Siberia 2 accounts for one-third of the gas that Russia would deposit in Europe in normal times.
Greater cooperation in the field of energy is an open goal, but rapprochement in the military field cannot be ruled out either. Moscow and Beijing are not formal allies – Putin would like that, Xi isn’t – but their armies are growing closer, for example with military exercises. The division of roles has always been for China to buy weapons and learn from the superior Russian armed forces, but that ratio is slowly changing. China has been catching up with state-of-the-art weapons arsenal, while Moscow is running out of weapons. According to news website Politico Russia is roaming the world for parts for weapons systems, especially semiconductors for hypersonic missiles. China could buy the desired American, Japanese and European chips to resell to Moscow.
This can be done secretly, because no one can check whether a container of microchips is passing somewhere on the 4,300 kilometer long border between Russia and China. Helping Russia openly is also a possibility, especially now that the US has just introduced a new export ban on chips to China and plans for more anti-China trade restrictions. Then there is no better company than Putin to show the home front and the rest of the world that Xi doesn’t care about the US.