China is the only friend that might help Russia blunt the impact of economic sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine, but President Xi’s government is giving no sign it might be willing to risk its own access to U.S. and European markets by doing too much.
— but will balk at openly violating sanctions and being targeted for penalties, experts said.
China, the world’s second-largest economy, is the only major government not to have condemned the invasion. Beijing has shown its self-interest by using pressure on Moscow from the 2014 sanctions as leverage to negotiate lower gas prices in an earlier contract. Also this week, China announced it would allow imports of wheat from all parts of Russia for the first time. That cannot replace all lost gas revenue if Europe stops buying but could help to buoy incomes of Russian farmers.
While trade deals will go ahead, “China will not side with Russia over its invasion of Ukraine,” said Zhang Lihua, an expert on Chinese-European relations at Tsinghua University in Beijing.
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