LONDON/BEIJING (Archyde.com) – Chinese President Xi Jinping will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin during his visit to Central Asia this week, his first foreign trip since the coronavirus outbreak. The move, which comes just a month before the Communist Party Congress, which will decide China’s unprecedented third term as China’s leader, shows Mr. Xi’s strong confidence in his ability to seize power at home. .
Xi is scheduled to visit Kazakhstan on the 14th. Xi will then meet with Putin on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, according to announcements by the Kazakhstan and Russian governments. Moscow has not released details of the talks, and China has yet to confirm Mr. Xi’s travel schedule.
The China-Russia summit would be an opportunity for Mr. Xi to show off his influence, and for Mr. Putin to show off his pro-Asian stance.
George Magnus, author of Red Flags, a book about Xi, said, “In my opinion, Xi is, in short, an international leader of countries who have shown how confident they are at home and who are competing against Western hegemonism. I want to be seen as,” he said.
“I imagine that Mr. Xi is most concerned about how the war put in place by Mr. Putin is going and whether Mr. Putin or Russia will actually play a role in the near future. Because China still needs anti-Western leadership from the Russian government.”
The deepening of an “unlimited” partnership between emerging superpower China and natural resource giant Russia is one of the most interesting geopolitical developments in recent years, with the West watching with trepidation.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia became less of a partner for China in the communist world. Meanwhile, China is expected to surpass the United States in the next decade to become the world’s largest economy.
The Sino-Russian partnership has been historically fraught with contradictions, but at a time when Russia’s relations with the West are at their weakest since the end of the Cold War, there are no signs that Mr. Xi will end his support for Putin.
Instead, the two leaders, who are the same age at 69, have deepened their ties, with trade between Russia and China soaring by nearly a third between January and July this year.
Alexander Korolev, Senior Lecturer (Politics and International Relations) at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, said of Xi’s foreign trip, “Not only will China continue to do business with Russia, but it will also offer clear support and support.” , shows that China has the will to accelerate the formation of a stronger Sino-Russian alliance.” “The Chinese government will not distance itself from Russia even in the face of serious image damage and the risk of secondary economic sanctions,” he said.
At the Communist Party Congress on October 16, Xi is expected to break with traditional practice and decide to enter a third term as president. Xi has met directly with Putin 38 times since taking office in 2013, but never met with Biden, who took office in 2021.
Xi met with Putin on February 4, 2019, just weeks before Russia invaded Ukraine, during a visit to China for the opening ceremony of the Beijing Winter Olympics. The two leaders declared an “unrestricted” partnership between the two countries.
China has also avoided criticizing Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, calling it a “special military operation” in line with Russia.
Steve Tsang, a professor at the Institute of China Studies at the Institute of Oriental and African Studies in London, said of Xi’s trip, “It’s clear that Mr. Xi supports Mr. Putin, there is no big message in it. Bigger.” The signal is that Mr. Xi will leave China for the first time since the pandemic ahead of the party convention, and if there is a secret rebellion against Mr. Xi, this is the time to surface it. “The fact that Mr. Xi is staying outside the country probably means that he is confident that such a move will not occur.”
Putin says Russia, which has looked to the West for centuries, is now turning its attention to Asia, as Russia has been subjected to the toughest sanctions in modern history by the West for the war in Ukraine.
Mr. Putin’s worldview is consistent with Mr. Xi’s view that China will replace the US-led post-World War II order.
As Europe seeks to move away from its reliance on Russian energy imports, Putin will seek to boost energy exports to China and Asia.
Mr Putin announced last week that he had agreed a major route to transport natural gas to China via Mongolia. For years, Russian gas giant Gazprom has been studying the possibility of a new massive pipeline, Power of Siberia 2, that would send Russian gas to China via Mongolia.
The pipeline has a transport volume of 50 billion cubic meters per year. That’s about a third of the gas Russia transports to Europe in peacetime, or the annual volume of Nord Stream 1.
(Guy Faulconbridge reporter, Yew Lun Tian reporter)