As relations with the West deteriorate, Putin and Xi Jinping grow closer

When Chinese President Xi Jinping welcomes leaders from around the world to the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics on Friday, it will be the first time he has met in person with foreign counterparts in more than 400 days. And at the top of their guest list is Russian President Vladimir Putin.

A summit between the two leaders, scheduled for the day of the opening ceremony, comes at a pivotal time for both sides, as the concentration of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border stokes fears of an imminent invasion – an event that is sure to overshadow China’s Olympic moment.

The face-to-face meeting will also add a new milestone in what has become an increasingly close partnership between Beijing and Moscow as relations with the West deteriorate for both.

Putin is among a small group of world leaders attending the Games, with Western governments including the United States, Britain and Australia declaring a diplomatic boycott over China’s human rights record. Other leaders declined invitations, citing Beijing’s strict controls over Covid-19.

That means Beijing 2022 will be in sharp contrast to the city’s 2008 Summer Games, when then-US President George Bush and other Western leaders were photographed welcoming Chinese officials as they cheered for their national teams.

Instead, this Olympics should highlight the gap that has emerged between China and the West over the past few years, as the summit – featuring Putin featured in a list of visiting dignitaries published by China’s Foreign Ministry – points to the closeness between the two neighboring powers.

The question being asked by many in the West is whether these Olympics will see a repeat of what happened during the last time Beijing hosted an Olympics, when Russia invaded a different former Soviet state, Georgia. And as tensions continue to mount on the Ukrainian border, all eyes will be on Putin.

“It’s a very dramatic moment in Russia’s confrontation with the West and, in a way, China’s confrontation with the West,” said Alexander Gabuev, Senior Fellow and Chair of the Russia Asia-Pacific Program at the Carnegie Moscow Center.

The fact that it represents the first face-to-face meeting between the two leaders in more than two years only serves to emphasize its significance.

Xi Jinping has not left China since January 2020, relying on “cloud diplomacy”, delivering speeches at major international events and meeting foreign leaders via video. It did not host a foreign dignitary for the entire year of 2021 as China kept its borders closed and its “Covid zero” policy.

In their last known face-to-face meetings, Xi welcomed Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni to Beijing in November 2020 and, before that, spoke with Pakistani President Arif Alvi in ​​March of that year.

New Aliance?

All of this comes at a time when Beijing and Moscow have been improving their partnership on trade, technology and coordination of military exercises, while becoming increasingly vocal about how their cooperation can set back a Western world order dominated by what China called “alliances and small cliques”.

In a video call with Putin in December, Xi Jinping called on China and Russia to “intensify coordination and collaboration in international affairs” and reject “hegemonic acts and the Cold War mentality”.

While analysts say Beijing is likely to keep a largely ambivalent tone and call for peace when it comes to future Russian action on Ukraine, China has already expressed sympathy for Moscow’s message to NATO – which calls for security guarantees to limit the organization’s presence over the years. from the Russian border.

In a phone call between China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last week, Wang urged that Russia’s “legitimate security concerns” be taken seriously.

Russia and China have a long history of supporting each other against what they see as Western interference in their domestic affairs, fending off US-led sanctions and often voting as a bloc at the UN.

On Monday, China was the only member of the United Nations Security Council to vote alongside Russia to disperse a US-convened council meeting to discuss Russia’s increased military presence on the Ukrainian border – a appeal that the eastern European country said was from the US “causing hysteria”.

Neighboring powers have grown closer over time because of their economic ties, the need for security along their 4,000-kilometer-long borders, as well as similarities in the nature of their regimes, according to Gabuev.

But the “secret ingredient” of closer ties in recent years has been the simultaneous clashes with Washington, he said.

“To Russia [as relações com os EUA] went from bad to worse […] and with China we saw a consistent US policy to compete with the Chinese,” said Gabuev.
2021 was a landmark year for Sino-Russian relations, as the two sides renewed a 20-year friendly cooperation treaty, amassed a record US$146 billion (approximately R$770 billion) in bilateral trade, and declared that their relations reached “the highest level” in history.

They also sought to strengthen the coordination of military exercises, carrying out a large-scale joint action in northern China and the first joint China-Russia naval patrol in the western Pacific.

However, those ties are still a long way from a formal military alliance and both have avoided becoming directly involved in the other’s potential conflicts, experts say – something that will likely be the case in the latest tensions.

“While Beijing is likely to show understanding of Russia’s security requests to NATO and the US and oppose Western provocations and sanctions, it has no real interest in getting involved in Russia’s conflicts with NATO,” said Anna Kireeva, a professor -associated with the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. “Policymakers in Moscow are well aware of this position.”

But the conflict in Europe would undoubtedly serve to strengthen ties, especially if Russia were hit with deep Western sanctions, increasing Moscow’s economic dependence on China. Beijing could also benefit from a shift in the US focus away from competition with China, analysts say.

The Putin-Xi friendship

Friday’s meeting before the Games could also show another side of the China-Russia dynamic: the close personal relationship between the two leaders.

This was shown in the run-up to the summit, with Xi in December calling Putin his “old friend” and saying he was “very looking forward” to the Olympic meeting.

“Despite all the structural issues that make the China-Russia relationship a complex and difficult strategic partnership, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are much more cooperative with each other compared to peers of leaders of the two nations in the recent past,” said Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute, University of London.

“There’s an element of personal chemistry in terms of both of them being strong leaders, and each appreciates the other for what they’ve accomplished,” Tsang said.

Putin will brief his Chinese counterpart on Russia’s negotiations with the United States and NATO, Russian state media said last month, while the two are expected to focus on strengthening cooperation in various areas.

This face-to-face meeting will provide an opportunity to “energize” their bilateral ties, according to Yu Bin, a professor of political science at the University of Wittenberg in Ohio and a senior fellow at the Center for Russian Studies at East China Normal University in Shanghai.

“On a personal level, don’t forget that both Putin and Xi are fans of various sports. They will enjoy the Olympics while talking about world issues,” he said, adding that China may not believe that a possible invasion, as described by Western governments, is imminent.

But deep questions about what might happen to Russia’s conflict with the West and Ukraine will certainly loom over the meeting.

The UN last month endorsed the customary “Olympic Truce” – a ceasefire during the Games, though Russia’s invasion of Georgia as well as Russian troops seizing Ukraine’s Crimea region shortly after the Winter Olympics of Russia in Sochi, stand out in recent memory.

But today, given the countries’ relationship, Putin can act more leniently, according to Gabuev of the Carnegie Moscow Center.

“My hunch is that Russia is apprehensive about China’s sensibilities when it comes to the opening ceremony and maybe some part of the Olympics,” he said.
“Russia wants to get enough media attention and also doesn’t want to steal attention from the meeting between Putin and Xi Jinping [… o que reforça a mensagem de que] even if sanctions happen, Russia is not alone, but will partner with another global superpower.”