WASHINGTON - President Joe Biden and his top officials promised this week to introduce additional sanctions aimed at impeding Russia's war efforts against Ukraine.
But the administration's attention is increasingly turning to the role China has played in supplying Russia with goods that have both civilian and military uses.
As one of the world's largest manufacturers of goods like electronics, drones and vehicle parts,
China has proven to be an especially crucial economic partner for Russia
.
Beijing has officially stayed out of the war.
However, China, along with countries like Turkey and some former Soviet republics, has stepped in to supply Russia with large volumes of products that could be used by civilians or the military, such as raw materials, smartphones, vehicles and computer chips, data shows. commercial.
President Joe Biden, left, is escorted by Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in Kyiv, Ukraine.
(Daniel Berehulak/The New York Times)
Administration officials are now expressing concern that China will further contribute to the Russian incursion by supplying Moscow with lethal weapons.
Although there is no clear evidence that China has supplied arms and ammunition to Russia,
Secretary of State Antony Blinken has warned in recent days that China may be preparing to do so
.
Biden, in a speech in kyiv on Monday, said the United States and its partners would announce new measures against sanctions evasion this week.
He did not specify whether those measures would be directed at Moscow or its trading partners.
"Together we have made sure that Russia pays the price for its abuses," he declared the following day in Warsaw, Poland.
And in a speech Tuesday at the Council on Foreign Relations, Wally Adeyemo, Treasury assistant secretary, said the United States would work "to identify and close the specific channels through which Russia intends to equip and finance its military."
"Our counter-evasion efforts will deny Russia access to dual-use goods being used for war and cut off these repurposed manufacturing facilities from the inputs needed to fill Russia's production gaps," he said.
The comments came on the same day that Wang Yi, the top Chinese diplomat, visited Moscow.
The actions that the United States has taken against Russia in collaboration with more than 30 countries constitute the broadest set of sanctions and export controls ever imposed against a major economy.
But this regime still has its limits.
One year after the war, the Russian economy is stagnant, but not paralyzed.
The country has lost direct access to coveted Western consumer brands and to imports of the latest technology, such as semiconductors.
But individuals and companies around the world have stepped in to supply Russia with black market versions of these same products, or cheaper alternatives made in China or elsewhere.
It seems that the products are still arriving in Russia, but by a longer route.
Exports from European countries to countries like Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have skyrocketed, as have exports from these countries to Russia, according to Matthew Klein, an economist who tracks trade volume trends. .
Both these data and Russian tax collections suggest that the country's total imports have essentially returned to pre-war levels, he said.
In particular, the United States and its allies appear to have had limited success in stopping
trade in so-called dual-use technologies
, which can be used in both military equipment and consumer goods.
The United States included many types of dual-use goods in the export controls it issued against Russia last February because the goods can be repurposed for military uses.
Aircraft parts that can be used by civilian airlines, for example, could be reused by the Russian air force, while semiconductors from washing machines and electronics could be used for tanks or other weaponry.
FILE - Ukrainian soldiers in the Donbas region fire a shell at enemy positions.
(Tyler Hicks/The New York Times)
Senior US officials warned their Chinese counterparts against supporting Russia's war efforts after last year's invasion of Ukraine, saying there would be harsh consequences.
Although China has been careful not to cross that line, it has provided support to Russia in other ways
, including actively trading certain goods.
The United States has cracked down on some of the companies and organizations that supply goods and services to Russia.
In January, it imposed sanctions on a Chinese company that had provided satellite images to the Wagner mercenary group, which has played a major role in the battle for eastern Ukraine.
In December, it added two Chinese research institutes to a list of entities that supply the Russian military, which will restrict their access to American technology.
But monitoring by research firms shows that trade in goods that the Russian military can use has flourished.
According to the Observatory for Economic Complexity, an online data platform, China's shipments to Russia of aluminum oxide, a metal that can be used in armored vehicles, personal protective equipment and ballistic shields, skyrocketed more than 25 times from 2021. to 2022.
Shipments of minerals and chemicals used in the production of missile casings, bullets, explosives and propellants have also increased
, according to the Observatory on Economic Complexity.
And China sent Russia last year $23 million worth of drones and $33 million of certain aircraft and spacecraft parts, up from zero the year before, according to the group's data.
Data from the Silverado Policy Accelerator, a Washington nonprofit, shows that Russian imports of integrated circuits, or chips, crucial for rebuilding tanks, planes, communications devices and weaponry, plummeted immediately after the invasion, but they increased last year.
Relations between the United States and China have soured in recent weeks following the flight of a Chinese surveillance balloon across the United States earlier this month.
But
divisions over Russia are further straining geopolitical ties
.
The meeting between Blinken and Wang, his Chinese counterpart, on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference on Saturday night was especially tense.
US officials have been sharing information about China's activities with allies and partners at their meetings in Munich, a person familiar with the matter said.
Speaking on "Face the Nation" on Sunday, Blinken said he had shared with Wang concerns that China was considering supplying weapons and ammunition to help Russia's campaign in Ukraine, and that such a move would have "serious consequences" for the relationship between the United States and China.
"To date, we've seen Chinese companies - and of course in China, there's really no distinction between private companies and the state - we've seen them provide non-lethal support to Russia for use in Ukraine," Blinken said.
"The concern we have now is, based on the information we have, that they are considering providing lethal support," he added.
"
And we've made it very clear to them that that would cause a serious problem for us and our relationship
."
US officials have stressed that China alone has limited ability to supply Russia with all the goods it needs.
China does not produce the most advanced types of semiconductors, for example, and restrictions imposed by the United States in October will prevent Beijing from buying some of the most advanced types of chips, and the equipment used to make them, from other parts of the world.
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