Latest news with #RussiaChina
New York Times
24-07-2025
- Business
- New York Times
How a Chinese Border Town Keeps Russia's Economy Afloat
Trainloads of Siberian lumber cross China's border, ready to be sliced and polished into furniture components and chopsticks. Truckloads of Russian rapeseed come across to be crushed for canola oil. And at a palatial used car showroom, Russians buy late-model used cars to send back to their hometowns. As is visible in Manzhouli, China's main border crossing with Russia, the two countries' economies are increasingly intertwined. China is the biggest buyer of Russian oil, timber and coal, and it will soon be the biggest buyer of Russian natural gas. Trade between the two countries exceeded $240 billion last year, up two-thirds since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. China has supplied many of the drones and drone components used by Russia in the conflict. China's staunch support for Russia's economy has helped Moscow survive: Dozens of countries have barred Russia from much of the global financial system, upending its economy at home. China has had the opposite reaction to Russia's war on Ukraine. 'China-Russia relations represent the most stable, mature and strategically significant major-country relationship in the world today,' Wang Yi, China's foreign minister, said this month after meeting Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov of Russia. Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Bloomberg
23-06-2025
- Politics
- Bloomberg
A Weakened Iran Can Still Inflict Pain on the US — and the World
When the dust settled on Iran's nuclear sites on Sunday after a US bombing raid that President Donald Trump said had 'totally obliterated' its atomic program, one thing was missing: its highly enriched uranium, which international authorities haven't seen for more than a week. While the US attacks have set back Iran's nuclear ambitions and dealt its clerical regime a humiliating blow, the program hasn't been completely destroyed. The US attack may ultimately lead Tehran to end international monitoring of its nuclear program and consider going ahead to develop a bomb. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the top ranks of his military and government winnowed by days of Israeli attacks, hasn't been seen in public in 11 days but remains in control. Even as allies Russia and China have stayed on the sidelines and its network of armed proxies in the region remains weakened, Tehran still has ways to inflict pain on the US as it plans its retaliation.
Reuters
18-06-2025
- Politics
- Reuters
Putin says Russia will hold military exercises with China in 2025
ST PETERSBURG, Russia, June 18 (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia will hold joint military exercises with China in 2025.
Forbes
17-06-2025
- Politics
- Forbes
Trump's G7 Russia-China Pitch To The Kananaskis G-7 Meeting An Insult
Protestors in a "Designated Demonstration Zone" at the Fenlands Banff Recreation Centre during the ... More Group of Seven (G-7) Leaders' Summit in Banff, Alberta, Canada, on Monday, June 16, 2025. US President Donald Trump proposed that Russia and China be invited to join the G-7 during his time at the Group of Seven summit. Photographer: Gavin John/Bloomberg Against the breathtaking backdrop of Canada's Rocky Mountains in Alberta, President Trump jolted the Kananaskis G-7 meeting with a bold and divisive proposal: expand the G7 to reinstate Russia and welcome China as members. This idea, presented as a somewhat inane gesture of pragmatic engagement, instead provoked strong opposition from world leaders, who condemned it as both strategically misguided and morally indefensible. While the debate over whether to engage or isolate adversarial states has long divided foreign policy circles, Trump's call to welcome two authoritarian powers into an alliance of democracies risks undermining not only the G7's moral authority but also the reason for its existence. Russia's exclusion from the G-8 in 2014 was not a bureaucratic oversight or political whim. It was a direct consequence and revulsion of its illegal annexation of Crimea and military intervention in Eastern Ukraine. That year, the planned Sochi summit was cancelled, and the group—then including Canada under Prime Minister Stephen Harper—chose to reconvene without Russia, formally reconstituting as the G7. Russia's return was made contingent on adherence to international law, a condition the Kremlin has continued to disregard. President Trump's assertion that Russia's exclusion 'made them feel left out,' potentially provoking further aggression, inverts both logic and historical fact. It was not exclusion that prompted invasion—it was invasion that necessitated exclusion. Trump's inaccurate attribution of Russia's ouster to 'Barack Obama and a person named Trudeau'—a factual error reported by multiple news outlets, as Justin Trudeau was not yet Prime Minister—only underscored the lack of diplomatic grounding in his proposal and at best, his poor memory. That memory also seems to omit the direct obligation the United States undertook in 1994 when Ukraine gave up its nuclear arsenal. In signing the Budapest Memorandum with the U.S., along with the U.K. and Russia, all guaranteed Ukraine's sovereignty in exchange for Kyiv relinquishing its third-largest stockpile of nuclear weapons in the world. But today the G7's consensus remains clear: Russia was removed due to its violations of sovereignty and international law, not out of spite. It is clear to the G-7 that reinstating Moscow without accountability would not deter further aggression—it would reward it. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, the global community has documented a harrowing list of atrocities: summary executions in Bucha, mass civilian graves in Mariupol and torture centres in Kherson. These were not isolated war crimes; they form part of a systematic campaign of brutality. Ukrainian Attorney Oksana Matviychuk, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and head of Ukraine's Center for Civil Liberties, has played a pivotal role in documenting these crimes and pursuing international justice. Her work—backed by the UN Human Rights Reports about Ukraine—reveals Russia's ongoing disregard for the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Inviting Russia back into the G7 while such abuses persist would not only be diplomatically premature; it would amount to a moral capitulation. Moreover, doing so would send a chilling message to survivors and victims: that justice is negotiable. It would erode the already fragile trust in international mechanisms designed to uphold human rights and prosecute war crimes. And for democracies seeking to defend a rules-based order, it would blur the line between accountability and acquiescence. Trump's suggestion to include China in the G7 only heightened concerns. Though Beijing wields significant global influence, it does so through a governance model that is antithetical to the G7's founding principles: a one-party authoritarian state that represses dissent, crushes free expression, and marginalizes ethnic and religious minorities. Allegations of forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience—particularly Falun Gong practitioners—have been substantiated by multiple investigations. The Kilgour-Matas Report (2006) and the Human Harvest documentary (2014) offer detailed evidence, supported by later public admissions from Chinese officials such as China's Vice Health Minister Huang Jiefu who admitted in 2015 that organs were harvested from death row inmates—finally put an end to the practice. In 2019, an independent China Tribunal in London, chaired by former prosecutor Sir Geoffrey Nice KC, concluded that forced organ harvesting had occurred 'on a significant scale.' These actions, gained recognition in many circles as genocide under international law and raise significant ethical concerns that should disqualify China from participating in a forum based on democratic accountability. President Trump framed his proposal as a strategy for peace through engagement, but critics argue that it represents appeasement disguised as diplomacy. Engagement must never come at the cost of principle. As the Council on Foreign Relations has noted, targeted sanctions and exclusion are crucial tools for upholding global norms and deterring impunity. There is also a practical dimension to exclusion: alliances derive their strength from internal cohesion and shared values. Diluting those principles to accommodate authoritarian outliers invites dysfunction and ideological drift. History teaches us that appeasement rarely yields peace—it emboldens aggression. The G7 is not merely a gathering of economic powers; it is not just about money and power; it represents a declaration of shared ethical values. Including states that reject those values sends a dangerous signal—that convenience outweighs accountability, and power overshadows principle. If Trump's proposal were to gain traction, the consequences would be severe. Ukraine's ongoing cases at the International Criminal Court, including the kidnapping of Ukrainian children that has resulted in an arrest warrant issued for President Putin, could lose credibility if Russia is re-legitimized. Allowing China and Russia entry would strengthen other autocratic regimes, reducing the deterrent influence of democratic alliances. The G7 could very well encounter internal divisions, which could weaken its ability to tackle global crises like climate change, cybersecurity and fair trade. Before many of the world's most serious problems could be discussed, Trump suddenly left the summit on its first evening, returning to Washington. But it needs to be said that Trump is not America, and even if he is not, America is still a democracy. Let us recall that Donald Trump, tried to overturn a lawful election, encouraged a violent mob to disrupt the transfer of power on January 6th, demanded loyalty from judges and officials over fidelity to the law, and labelled the press and political opposition as enemies. He has attacked American universities on dubious grounds. This conduct shows contempt for democratic norms. Meanwhile America remains a democracy so long as it has a free press, its courts enforce the rule of law, its universities and most other institutions still honour the Constitution. These fundamental safeguards—an independent judiciary, protected speech, and electoral accountability—have thus far contained Trump's authoritarian impulses and preserved democratic order despite repeated tests. Founded in the 1970s as a coalition of leading democracies, the G7 represents more than just GDP. It embodies a commitment to civil liberties, free press, open societies, and the rule of law. Admitting states like Russia and China to the G-7 would fundamentally alter that identity. While strategic engagement with adversaries is a legitimate foreign policy tool, there is a difference between discussing matters across the table and granting those same adversaries a seat at it. One does not join with a Hitler, but seeks to restrict him. Therefore, until Russia ends its war and China demonstrates tangible human rights reform, their participation in the G7 should remain not only unwelcome—but unthinkable. Meanwhile, the Kananaskis G-7 meeting seriously needs to reconsider whether they want a 'friend of Putin's' to sit at their table as they discuss their security in a turbulent world.
Zawya
17-06-2025
- Business
- Zawya
Israel-Iran conflict will spur Russia-China gas deal, Russian adviser says
Rising tensions in the Middle East will accelerate natural gas negotiations between Russia and China, with a decision likely this year, the head of a think-tank that advises the Russian government on China told Reuters. Russia has been seeking a deal to build the Power of Siberia-2 pipeline to deliver 50 billion cubic metres of gas a year to China, but the two sides have not been able to agree on terms. "With the sharp rise in tensions in the Middle East, it is advantageous for China to increase supplies from the north," said Kirill Babaev, head of the China and Contemporary Asia Institute in Moscow. Israel and Iran attacked each other for a fifth straight day on Tuesday, raising the risk of further unrest and the potential disruption of oil and gas supplies from the Middle East. "The issue of the gas deal will arise again because this deal is capable of guaranteeing China an uninterrupted supply of energy. Under current conditions, by the end of the year, we will see a decision on the Power of Siberia-2," Babaev added. Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to travel to China in early September to participate in celebrations marking the anniversary of the victory over Japan in World War II. The trip follows Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit to Moscow in May. Babaev, whose think tank is involved in preparing Putin's agenda, said that the visit will be filled with political and economic discussions. Economic cooperation with China has helped Russia in the face of Western sanctions imposed after its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. MUTUAL UNDERSTANDING Trade between Russia and China jumped by 26% in 2023 though by just 1.9% in 2024. It fell by 7.5% in the first four months of 2025 but Babaev said that new energy and agriculture export deals could revive growth this year. He said problems with cross-border payments, caused by the threat of secondary Western sanctions against Chinese banks, which strained relations between Russia and China in 2024, have eased. "We have a mutual understanding with our Chinese partners that money prefers silence. The less publicity surrounds these matters, the more successfully these payments proceed. The Chinese side is cooperating with us, and new mechanisms are working fine," Babaev said. A delegation of Chinese officials and executives will attend the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, Russia's main economic conference, this week and participate in a panel discussion with Putin. Babaev said that Chinese investors are active in the agriculture, oil and gas processing, food, logistics, and pulp and paper sectors, but they often operate through intermediaries, and their presence is not always reflected in statistics. "Chinese investors are entering the Russian market very cautiously and try not to make their presence too visible by establishing joint ventures with Russian companies and operating under new brands," he said. (Reporting by Gleb Bryanski)
