The relations between China and Russia have reached a new level after President Putin of Russia and his counterpart President Xi Jinping of China met in Beijing China where 15 agreements were signed and released a document about international issues.
In a joint statement released, China and Russia affirmed that their new partnership is superior to any political or military alliance of the cold war era.
” Friendship between two states has no limits, there are no forbidden areas of cooperation”, they also announced plans to collaborate in a host of areas including space, climate change, artificial intelligence, and control of the Internet.
It seems China and Russia have finally decided to stand against the US and its allies’ dominance of world affairs and the unilaterally use of sanctions to punish countries they disagree with on their foreign policy, democracy, and other issues like human rights, media, internet, and trade.
China and Russia are not allies but this meeting between President Xi Jinping of China and President Vladimir Putin of Russia affirms one thing, they are ready to work together in order to defend their own interests which have been constantly threatened by the US and its allies.
China And Russia Mutual Support
The two have been moving closer since 2008 after the US messed up the international financial system causing a big financial crisis that even today many countries haven’t truly recovered from, but the turning point in their relationship came in 2014 after Russia annexed Crimea in a referendum vote where the US and its allies reacted by imposing severe sanctions that almost destroyed Russia’s economy.
After the sanctions were imposed on Russia, China came at Russia’s rescue with a 400 billion dollar deal to supply gas to China for 30 years and China also became a big market for Russia’s products that were banned under sanctions from Western markets and at the same time, Russia received many products from China to sustain its supply-chain at home since it couldn’t get them from the west due to sanctions.
China and Russia have also been supporting each other in the security council pushing against the US, France, and the UK who other permanent members of the UN security council on issues like the Syria war, human rights abuse accusation, Ukraine and Iran new deal.
Russia has also offered full support to China on the Taiwan issue saying that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China and opposed any form of Independence for Taiwan. The two countries have also voiced their own opposition to the AUKUS deal reached among Australia, the UK, and the US to supply Australia with nuclear-powered submarines saying it’s a destabilizing group and that it will increase the dangers of the arms race in the region.
China also supported Russia’s call to end NATO’s expansion towards the East and has called on US and NATO to take Russia’s security concerns seriously, Russia is demanding security guarantees from US and NATO and has been at the heart of the current crisis in Europe over Ukraine.
China and Russia also expressed stronger opposition to the US plans to develop and deploy global missile defense systems and also opposed the US plans to deploy some elements in various regions of the world, combined with capacity building of high-precision non-nuclear weapons for disarming strikes( ballistic missiles) and other strategic objectives.
Collaboration In Tech And Energy
Both China and Russia have affirmed the readiness to work together and strengthen cooperation on artificial intelligence and information security. This means that the two countries will not accept any attempts from the West to regulate some parts of their internet as they see fit in their own regions.
Russia’s two energy companies in oil and gas, Gazprom and Rosneft have agreed to supply China with oil and gas after new agreements were signed which sent a clear message to the US and its allies that Russia will sell its oil and gas to China if Europe doesn’t want it in case of sanctions.
China has managed to single-handedly support Iran-oil exports since the Trump administration imposed severe sanctions on the country, helping it to financially stay afloat and also help its economy from being destroyed by sanctions.
Russia is also a top supplier of energy to China and this has been Vladimir Putin’s aim since coming to power in 1999 of diversifying Russian reliance on the west for energy export.
Trade And D-dollaralisation
Trade volume between China and Russia has been increasing at record levels never seen before reaching 146.88 billion dollars in 2021, that’s an increase of 35.8% year-on-year.
China exported to Russia goods with 67. 56 billion dollars while Russia exported goods and services to China worth 79.32 billion dollars.
Both countries have also affirmed their commitment to increase trade in their local currencies because of unpredictability surrounding the use of the dollar. This process has been going on since 2014 and the transactions in trade using their own currencies have reached 20%.
With the threat of the US and its allies to cut Russian companies from accessing the dollar or trading using the dollar, a threat which has also been hanging on Beijing’s head is increasing every day due to the Ukraine crisis, both countries have found a need to create a new financial system to help with international transactions away from the reach of the US and its allies.
The world will be watching to see if they are able to implement any of the agreed issues that may have the greatest implications for the world in this decade as geopolitical tensions intensify.
If China and Russia truly come together against the west, the most likely outcome is that the west will not only have a hard time but also will likely lose its global influence in the coming decades.
