Amid the elaborate ceremony of a visit to Beijing, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday failed once again to persuade Chinese leader Xi Jinping to sign off on a major new gas pipeline, underscoring once again the importance — and limitations — of Russia’s growing dependency on China for energy sales.
However, the two leaders, who are longtime allies but also uneasy neighbors, were united in portraying themselves as stabilizing forces seeking to counter chaos unleashed by the United States in recent months.
Just days after President Donald Trump visited Beijing, Putin and Xi appeared to take swipes at the U.S. war against Iran and the American military’s toppling of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.
In a joint statement, Xi and Putin condemned what they called “treacherous military strikes against other countries, the hypocritical use of negotiations as cover for preparing such strikes, the assassination of leaders of sovereign states, the destabilization of the domestic political situation in these states and the provocation of regime change, and the brazen kidnapping of national leaders for trial.”
“Unilateral hegemony is rampant,” Xi said, according to a Chinese government readout of the meeting, in a clear dig at the United States.
Xi also said that “a comprehensive cessation of hostilities” in the Middle East “is of the utmost urgency,” telling Putin during the talks, according to China’s Xinhua News Agency, that this “would help reduce disruptions to the stability of energy supplies, the smooth operation of industrial and supply chains, and the international trade order.”
“The world today is far from peaceful, with unilateralism and hegemonism posing grave dangers, and the world facing the risk of regressing to the law of the jungle,” Xi told Putin, according to the state-controlled Xinhua agency.
But while the two leaders sought to emphasize their partnership against arbitrary actions by other nations, China also sided with Russia in calling for eradicating what Moscow describes as “the root causes” of its war against Ukraine.
This demand, which China signed off on in the joint statement with Russia, signals that Beijing continues to back Moscow’s hard-line goal of dismantling Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s pro-Western government and ensuring that Ukraine never enters NATO.
Despite the concerted show of cooperation and bonhomie, tensions have been simmering under the surface between the two countries as Moscow grows increasingly reliant on Beijing for Chinese purchases of Russian energy and supplies of Chinese components to sustain the war against Ukraine.
There is also deep distrust between the neighboring countries’ security services, and Russia is investigating at least one case of alleged espionage by China, according to Western officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy. Both sides, however, have avoided making the case public to minimize fallout.
Putin had hoped to use the visit to finally win Xi’s approval of Russia’s long-standing proposal to build the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline, which could carry 50 billion cubic meters of Russian natural gas annually to China. But that effort appeared to fall flat Wednesday.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Wednesday that there is still no information about specific timelines for the launch of the project.
“In fact, the president said during the talks that there is already a general understanding of the main parameters of Power of Siberia 2,” Peskov said. “There is an understanding of the route and of how it will be built. Some details still need to be finalized, but overall such an understanding already exists.”
Moscow has also been increasingly concerned by China’s role as a major source of components for Ukraine’s drone industry, helping drive a huge ramp-up in production over the past year, even as Russia relies on these supplies as well, analysts said.
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