Mr Xi may feel comfortable about showing solidarity with Mr Putin because any Western sanctions imposed on Russia will probably have only limited effects on its economic relationship with China. Mr Gabuev says he would expect China to adhere to the legal requirements of any Western sanctions, such as not banking with blacklisted oligarchs. Nonetheless China will find plenty of ways to keep business flowing. Huawei, a Chinese telecoms giant, should be able to sell 5gtechnology to Russia, whereas Ericsson and Nokia, two Western competitors, may be locked out. China’s development banks can lend to Russian enterprises with less fear of running afoul of financial sanctions targeting commercial lending. And the two countries have steadily reduced their reliance on the dollar to settle trade, part of Russia’s efforts to insulate itself from American sanctions.
But there are risks to Mr Xi’s cosying up to Mr Putin. Writing in Foreign Affairs, Jude Blanchette and Bonny Lin of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, a think-tank, argue that a “tighter Beijing-Moscow axis would further encourage China’s rivals to balance against it”. That includes Europe, where attitudes appear to have hardened since February 4th. Jens Stoltenberg, secretary-general of nato, on February 15th described the “two authoritarian powers” as “operating together”.
This perception troubles Chinese analysts. Yang Cheng of Shanghai International Studies University says China worries it could be “treated as Russia’s accomplice”. But he says that perception is the product of the imagination of America and its allies. China’s opposition to nato expansion, he adds, stems from empathy for Russia, in the pressure they both feel from the West.
Mr Yang says this “in no way” means that China supports the current developments in Ukraine. But the West’s tendency to view China and Russia as tied together is “dangerous”, he says. “It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy that will turn the world into a dangerous situation that could be colder and longer than the cold war.” ■