China has said it will not circumvent Western sanctions against Moscow

China is not “deliberately” circumventing Western sanctions against Russia, Beijing said today, the day after an EU warning that any support for Moscow would damage its economic relations with Europe.

A close ally of Moscow, Beijing has so far refrained from condemning the Russian invasion and has called on all parties to show restraint.

Westerners are pressuring the Asian giant to make clear its opposition to the Kremlin attack.

Speaking to Chinese leaders on Friday, the EU warned that any support for Moscow to circumvent Western sanctions would damage Beijing’s economic ties with Europe, its largest trading partner.

“We are not doing anything to deliberately circumvent the sanctions imposed on Russia,” said Wang Lutong, China’s foreign policy chief.

Beijing opposes sanctions against Russia and considers them counterproductive to resolving the situation in Ukraine.

Chinese companies, however, remain cautious in their dealings with Russia, fearing they may be indirectly affected by the sanctions.

“China is not involved in the Ukraine crisis […] “Therefore, our trade with Moscow should not be the target of these sanctions,” Wang told reporters the day after the China-EU summit.

While the communist government is defending its “rock-solid” friendship with Moscow, the EU wants to prevent China from actively supporting Russia in its war against Urania by buying more hydrocarbons or providing financial assistance.

Such support “would seriously tarnish China’s reputation in Europe”, where companies “look at how countries are positioned”, European Commission President Ursula von der Layen said on Friday after her video conference with the Chinese president. Xi Jinping.

“We hope that China will take into account the importance of its international image and its economic relationship with the EU,” said European Council President Charles Michel, who attended the video conference.

Beijing has also demanded that the role it can play against Moscow in ending hostilities in Ukraine should not be “overestimated”.

“You are telling the Russians ‘you have to stop this war’ and the Russians are stopping it: it does not work that way,” Wang said, noting that the invasion of Ukraine was an “independent decision made by Russia”.

Beijing declares to the EU that it will seek peace in Ukraine

China offered reassurances to the European Union on Friday that it would seek peace in Ukraine, but stressed that this would be done on its own terms, pushing back for a tougher stance on Russia.

Premier Li Keqiang told EU leaders Beijing would push for peace in “its own way”, while President Xi Jinping said he hoped the EU would confront China with an “independent” stance in a nod to them. Europe’s close ties with the United States.

The EU yesterday tried to persuade China to refuse to help Moscow tackle Western sanctions during a virtual summit in which Beijing sought to renew its economic ties with war-torn Europe.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel, speaking on behalf of the Member States, spoke with Li Keqiang for at least two hours yesterday morning.

“On Ukraine, Li Keqiang has stated that China opposes both hot and cold wars, divisions between coalitions, and refuses to take sides,” Wang Lutong, who is in charge of Europe in China, wrote on Twitter. Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

For the EU, the main purpose of the summit was to urge China not to overly support Russia.

The EU told Beijing during the virtual meeting with Li and Xi that it would not allow Moscow to circumvent Western sanctions imposed over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“We call on China to help end the war in Ukraine. China can not turn a blind eye to Russia’s violation of international law,” Michel told a news conference with von der Layen after the first EU-China meeting since the summit from 30 December 2020.

“Any attempt to circumvent sanctions or provide assistance to Russia will prolong the war,” he said.

China is forging closer energy, trade and security ties with Moscow, positioning itself as a world power that can stand up to the United States. Weeks before the February 24 invasion, Beijing and Moscow declared a strategic partnership “without limits.”

Li told EU leaders that China has always sought peace and promoted negotiations and is willing to continue to play a constructive role with the international community, state-run CCTV reported. CCTV also quoted Xi as commenting on an independent EU policy.

Michel noted that the two sides agreed that the war, which Russia calls a “special military operation”, threatens global security and the world economy.

China has refused to condemn or call Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine an invasion and has repeatedly criticized what it calls illegal and unilateral Western sanctions.

Michel and von der Layen described the tone of the summit as “open and honest”, while the commission president stressed that trade between two of the world’s largest economies was much larger than China’s economic ties with Russia.

More than a quarter of China’s world trade was with the European bloc and the United States last year, up from just 2.4% with Russia, an EU official said.

China is concerned that European countries are taking tougher foreign policy elements from Washington and has called on the EU to “exclude foreign intervention” from its relations with China. In 2019, the EU switched from a mild diplomatic language to branding China a systemic adversary.

The EU, Britain and the United States have imposed sanctions on Chinese officials over alleged human rights abuses in the Xinjiang region, prompting Beijing to react in kind, freezing an already-concluded EU-China investment deal.

China has also since suspended imports from Lithuania after the Baltic EU member state allowed Taiwan to open a de facto embassy in its capital, angering Beijing.

The president of the European Commission said that Beijing must defend the international order that has made China the second largest economy in the world. The West says Russia’s invasion of Ukraine violates the United Nations Charter.

“This is a crucial moment because nothing will be the same as it was before the war. Now it is a matter of taking a very clear stance to support and defend the rule-based order,” he said.