China has become a geopolitical hotbed in recent days. Less than 24 hours from the gigantic military parade in the Tiananmén Square on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of Japan’s surrender in (1937-1945) and the end of World War II, Chinese President Xi Jinping, held on Tuesday a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. The meeting, held behind closed doors, has continued with an informal talk around a tea table in the private residence of the Chinese leader in Beijing. Meanwhile, the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-Un, another of the guests of exception to commemoration is expected to reach the Chinese capital.
The closeness of Xi and Putin is palpable and growing in each meeting. They already exceed 40 face to face, and they are called to each other “old friend.” With Beijin turned into the main support of its economy, crossed by the war in Ukraine, this trip of the Russian president – who started Sunday when he landed in the city of Tianjin to attend a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (OCS) – He has resulted in the announcement, by an agreement to build the Power of Siberia 2 Mongolia, as well as with an agreement to expand by two other routes.
The pact, signed after years of hesitation and delays, is a new step in the already close energy alliance between Russia and China. It foresees the shipment of up to 50,000 million cubic meters (50 BCM, in the energy slang) of gas per year during the next three decades, as reported by the Russian news agencies and collects Bloomberg. Beijing will get a lower price than Gazprom today charges its customers in Europe.
“The relations between China and Russia have resisted the test of international fluctuations,” said XI during the meeting, according to the official reading collected by the Chinese agency Xinhua. The president has also encouraged both parties to “boost large -scale projects” and to raise their “strategic tune.”
The official note does not express express to the gas supply agreement, although to the signing of 20 bilateral cooperation “documents in areas that go from energy to space exploration, a field in which they already collaborate closely for, for example, to establish a permanent basis on the moon.
The proximity of Beijing to Moscow has been, since, one of the great friction points in the relations of the Asian giant with the West. The battle on European land – which China has never condemned, and the one that does not even call “war” – has not been mentioned in the official reading of this Tuesday’s meeting in Beijing, in which there is only a generic reference to which they discussed international and regional issues of common interest.
Putin did expose, during the Summit of the OCS, where he thanked the “efforts” and the “proposals” of China and India aimed at “facilitating the resolution of the Ukraine crisis”, and said: “This conflict did not arise as a result of a ‘attack by Russia against Ukraine’, but as a consequence of a coup d’etat in Ukraine instigated by the West in 2014,” Russian state Tass. The Kremlin made the decision to, thus initiating a war still underway and of uncertain end.
Approach with North Korea
For his part, the North Korean Kim, who travels in a railway convoy (his usual transport mode), goes to Beijing for the first time since 2019 with the intention of restoring the ties with which he has been his main economic and diplomatic ally for years. And it can also be seen with the Russian president, with whom he has shown a growing affinity in recent years. His tuning materialized in 2024 with the between Russia and North Korea in case of aggression, and.
Although China is the main strategic ally of North Korea, relations between Beijing and Pyongyang had cooled in recent years, so it is expected that the visit will serve as an approach between the two neighbors, who share almost 1,400 kilometers of land border.
In the parade, western leaders are not expected, with the exception of the Prime Minister of Slovakia, Robert Fico, Putin Putin in the EU. The event is planned to go 26 heads of state and government, among which are, in addition to Putin and Kim, the president of Belarus, Aleksandr Lukashenko; that of Iran, Masoud fishshkian; that of Indonesia, Pabowo Subianto; and the leader of the Military Board of Myanmar, Min hug hlaing.
