ABSTRACT
If we look at China’s aspirations and concerns in the global space, it is safe to say that the war in Ukraine has been a distinctly disturbing factor for China. As Qin Gang, the then ambassador to Washington who has since become foreign minister, put it, it is an “unwanted conflict.” 1 We do not know whether Xi Jinping encouraged Vladimir Putin when they met in Beijing on February 4, just before the war broke out, or whether there was no talk of war, which is hard to imagine, given that hundreds of thousands of Russian troops were already on the Ukrainian border. The lengthy Sino-Russian agreement signed at the time, which covers a lot of ground, does not mention Ukraine, but it does state—and the Chinese use this in countless arguments—that the parties oppose the further enlargement of NATO, and call on the North Atlantic Alliance to abandon ideological Cold War approaches, to respect the sovereignty, security, and interests of other countries and their civilizational, cultural and historical diversity, and to contribute fairly and objectively to the peaceful development of other states. 2 The treaty also states that the friendship of the two countries shall “have no limits” and that there are no forbidden areas of cooperation. Twenty days later, these phrases took on a special significance, certainly in the sense of whether they would stand up in the new situation as applied to war.
