Defying US pressure, China rolls out red carpet for Putin

Putin’s attendance at BRI summit marks his highest-profile overseas trip since being accused of Ukraine war crimes

- Brian Spegele

Inside the Great Hall of the People here last week, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) implored leader Xi Jinping to distance himself from Russian President Vladimir Putin, arguing that Putin, a pariah in the West, was holding back China's ambitions.

Instead of heeding that advice, China on Tuesday welcomed Putin to Beijing with open arms, in the Russian leader's first major visit abroad since the International Criminal Court accused him of committing war crimes in Ukraine.

Putin arrived in the Chinese capital by plane on Tuesday morning, with state-media footage showing him shaking hands warmly on the tarmac with Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao and receiving a red-carpet welcome from a military honor guard. The split screen of a burst of diplomacy in China's capital over the last two weeks shows how the US has failed to break the ties between Moscow and Beijing, nearly 20 months into the Ukraine war.

Russia and China trade links are surging, for instance, with Chinese companies selling Russia many of the technologies it struggles to source from elsewhere because of U.S. sanctions, including semiconductors and industrial machinery. China meanwhile imports huge volumes of Russian oil and gas, purchases that help fill Moscow's financial coffers.

This week, Putin is in Beijing to lend his support to Xi's signature Belt and Road Initiative, which for the past decade has used railroads, ports and other projects to expand Chinese economic influence abroad. US officials are skeptical of the Chinese initiative, in part due to the high levels of debt that Beijing has heaped on some participant countries.