China is not leaving Russia's side, despite the war in Ukraine.
This is also due to the confrontation with the USA.
Munich/Beijing – The Ukraine war rages on with the same level of brutality, more than a year after the Russian incursion began.
Also unchanged: China's position in the conflict.
Even before the war began, Xi Jinping had sided with Vladimir Putin, and China's head of state and party leader has no intention of leaving this position.
This became clear once again on Tuesday, when China's new Foreign Minister Qin Gang again underlined his country's ties to the Kremlin at a press conference on the fringes of the annual session of the National People's Congress in Beijing: "The more turbulent the world is, the more consistent the Russian-Chinese relationships progress," Qin said.
However, the relations are not an alliance and are not directed confrontationally against third parties, the Foreign Minister asserted, but also described the relationship with Russia as a "model for new international relations".
He accused the United States of fueling the conflict.
Without explicitly naming Washington, Qin whispered: "There seems to be an invisible hand that is pushing for the conflict to be dragged on and escalated, and is using the Ukraine crisis to advance a certain geopolitical agenda." It ended almost identically February Wang Yi, China's top diplomat, voiced at the Munich Security Conference.
China believes that NATO and the US are to blame for the escalation of the war.
Russia, on the other hand, continues to absolve Beijing of responsibility;
direct criticism of the war crimes committed by the Russian army in Ukraine has not yet been publicly expressed in China.
China demands peace in Ukraine and denies wanting to supply arms to Russia
At the same time, China is presenting itself as a neutral observer in the conflict. Beijing is also demanding that the war be ended through diplomatic channels.
"Either hostilities cease, peace is restored and the process of a peaceful settlement begins -- or more fuel is added to the fire and the crisis widens and spirals out of control," Qin said Tuesday.
“Conflict, sanctions and pressure will not solve the problem.
What is needed now is calm, reason and dialogue.” However, Beijing has so far failed to take any concrete steps to create peace between Russia and Ukraine.
China's government recently published a twelve-point paper on the Ukraine war, but only repeated well-known positions in it.
Many observers were disappointed with the paper,
In addition, Beijing leaves largely open what such a peace could look like.
China demands that the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all countries must be preserved;
However, Beijing does not explain exactly what this means for the areas occupied by Russia in Ukraine.
In any case, Beijing has not explicitly called for a withdrawal of Russian troops.
In Beijing, Foreign Minister Qin Gang again denied allegations that China was planning to supply Russia with weapons.
“China did not create the crisis.
It is not a party in crisis and has not supplied weapons to either side," Qin said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said a few weeks ago that Beijing was considering "providing lethal support to Russia in its aggression against Ukraine," "everything from ammunition to the weapons themselves."
Blinken has not yet provided any evidence for his claim.
However, there have long been signs that state-owned Chinese armaments companies are supplying goods to Russia that could also be used militarily - a violation of US sanctions that China has not adopted, but is not officially circumventing either.
China and Russia: 'borderless' partnership against US
In the Ukraine war, for example, China finds itself in a dilemma.
On the one hand, the West's conflict with Russia comes in handy for Beijing, because China explicitly opposes the US-led world order.
Shortly before the war began, Moscow and Beijing had secured their “borderless” partnership with the aim of breaking US dominance.
In addition, China is becoming more and more important as a trading partner for Russia and is acquiring cheap oil and gas;
Conversely, for example, the market share of Chinese car manufacturers in Russia is increasing.
Last year, trade between the two countries rose to a record high of almost 180 billion euros.
At the same time, however, Beijing does not seem to have reckoned with the war dominating relations with the West even after more than a year.
Above all, the united appearance of the Europeans and the USA seems to have surprised China's leadership.
Foreign Minister Qin said on Tuesday he hopes "that Europe, having endured the suffering of the war in Ukraine, will learn from its pain and achieve genuine strategic autonomy and long-term stability" - apparently in an attempt to wedge the transatlantic relationship to drive.
Head of state and party leader Xi Jinping also made it clear on Monday that China is viewing the Ukraine war primarily with a view to the confrontation with the USA: "The Western countries in particular, led by the USA, are pursuing a comprehensive containment, encirclement and suppression of China , posing unprecedented severe challenges for China's development," Xi told delegates of the Consultative Conference, an advisory body, during the annual session of the People's Congress.
Such open, aggressive words towards Washington are not otherwise heard from Xi.
Rubric list image: © Sergei Bobylev/Imago
