As Ukraine scrambles to keep international support with Russia’s invasion grinding into a third year, its leader has made clear one country he would like to see join his push for peace: China.
Ratcheting up pressure on Beijing – Moscow’s most powerful political ally – appeared as a key talking point for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other officials this week during a gathering of the global elite in Switzerland’s Davos.
There, Zelensky told reporters he would “very much like China to be involved” in Ukraine’s peace plan. His foreign minister said the country wanted more contact with China at “all levels,” Interfax-Ukraine reported, while Zelensky’s chief of staff left the door open that the wartime leader could even meet China’s top delegate on the gathering’s sidelines.
But Chinese Premier Li Qiang appeared to depart the World Economic Forum earlier this week without meeting Zelensky – and didn’t directly address the conflict in a roughly 25-minute speech that focused heavily on reassuring his audience about China’s faltering economy.
Even as Chinese officials last year ramped up efforts to present the country as a potential peace broker in the war, analysts say it’s unlikely Beijing sees now as the time to leverage its deep and growing Russia ties to ramp up a push for its end – especially on Ukraine’s terms.
“China thinks it is already playing an important role in moving toward peace. It’s just the Chinese version of peace is not what Zelensky wants to see,” said Yun Sun, director of the China program at the Washington-based Stimson Center think tank.
Last year, after Chinese leader Xi Jinping spoke to Zelensky for the first time some 14 months after the war began, Beijing dispatched an envoy to both Kyiv and Moscow. It has also released its own proposal for peace, which unlike Ukraine’s demands, calls for a ceasefire without the prior withdrawal of Russian troops illegally occupying Ukrainian territory.
Now, the latest events at Davos spotlight China’s wait-and-see approach when it comes to any further push to bring the war to a close, analysts say, as fighting remains locked in stalemate with neither side giving signs of backing down – and another major conflict, in the Middle East, draws global attention.
“China previously might have wanted to mediate because it didn’t want Russia to lose too badly. But now there is less worry on that front … China has more incentive to observe how battlefield development will evolve, which will form the foundation for any (peace) negotiation,” according to Sun.
“Now that the US is distracted by Gaza and the resources available to Ukraine are more limited, things have shifted in Russia’s favor. There is even less reason for China to ‘advance a fair peace as advocated by the West and Ukraine,’” she said.
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