Welcome back to the China In Eurasia briefing, an RFE/RL newsletter tracking China's resurgent influence from Eastern Europe to Central Asia. This will be the last briefing of the year as I'll be off for the holidays starting next week. Thank you for subscribing and helping grow this newsletter. See you in 2024!
I'm RFE/RL correspondent Reid Standish and here's what I'm following right now.
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Is The Wind Now At Xi and Putin's Backs?
From deepening cracks in Western unity for Ukraine to questions over resolve to support Taiwan, both Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin appear to be feeling that time is on their side.
But are Xi and Putin truly entering 2024 with the wind at their backs?
Finding Perspective: Putin seems convinced that the answer is yes.
Addressing officials at a December 8 reception at the Kremlin, the Russian president seemed emboldened, saying Kyiv is running out of time and weapons, and that Ukraine has "nothing, they have no future."
Putin's optimism stems from U.S. funding for Ukraine continuing to be held up due to political battles in Congress, leading to warnings from the White House that funding to send weapons and assistance to Ukraine could run out by the end of the year.
Adding to this are recent reports that previous years of budget cuts combined with advanced support for Ukraine has left most European militaries weakened and their weapons arsenals empty.
A series of recent polls also show Donald Trump leading U.S. President Joe Biden by several percentage points, a development likely to be welcomed by Beijing and Moscow as it could lead to a more isolationist United States that would weaken support for U.S. allies in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, particularly Ukraine and Taiwan.
Why It Matters: 2024 is shaping up to be a major inflection point.
The battlefield in Ukraine has slipped into stalemate and Western unity is likely to show more cracks with elections in Europe -- not to mention the upcoming U.S. presidential election -- likely to turn support for Kyiv into a ballot box issue.
January elections in Taiwan are set to be an early litmus test, and it's difficult for any candidate running to credibly say they're confident Washington will come to its aid given the waning support facing Ukraine at the moment.
But some added perspective is needed here as it can be easy to lose track that Xi and Putin are facing immense pressures as well.
Xi is grappling with a slowing economy and has recently done a sweeping reshuffle of Beijing's upper echelons, including removing foreign and defense ministers this year.
Putin has managed to reorganize the Russian economy for the war effort, and the Kremlin has mostly successfully navigated Western sanctions. Polls also show that a majority of Russians still support the war nearly two years in.
But Russia's long-term economic prospects look much more bleak, and the high casualties from the war have only increased the country's demographic pressures.
In the end, it may come down to who blinks first.
When I interviewed Taiwanese Deputy Foreign Minister Roy Chun Lee in May and asked him if he believes Western support for Ukraine has surprised and deterred Chinese designs on Taiwan, his answer was that it's still too soon to say. "I think China is waiting to see what happens two years from now and three years from now," he said.
A lot can happen between now and then.
Podcast Corner: How Von Der Leyen Became the EU's Top China Hawk
Listen to the latest episode of the China In Eurasia podcast. You can find the show on Spotify, Apple, Google, and YouTube.
European Union leaders used a high-profile summit in Beijing last week to press Xi and China's leadership on a host of contentious issues ranging from trade to Ukraine.
This sharpening approach from Brussels has largely stemmed from a policy turn championed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who has pushed to reduce the bloc's dependencies on China.
But what's behind von der Leyen's views and what do they mean for the future of the EU and China?
On the latest episode of Talking China In Eurasia, I explore this with RFE/RL Europe Editor Rikard Jozwiak, who explains von der Leyen's rise and the deepening competition between Beijing and Brussels. Listen here.
Be sure to listen and leave a review on your listening platform of choice. I'd also love to hear what you think. Reach out at Standishr@rferl.org
Three More Stories From Eurasia
1. EU-China Summit Wrap-Up
The EU held its long-awaited summit in Beijing with Xi last week. The meeting wrapped up with few deliverables and mostly laid out the rules of the road for their relationship in the future.
Here are the main takeaways.
The Details: Ahead of the summit, EU officials told RFE/RL that they were pleased they were able to secure a working lunch meeting with Xi for von der Leyen and European Council President Charles Michel.
In the lead-up to the summit, many in Brussels felt frustrated that Beijing wasn't taking their geopolitical concerns seriously enough, as I reported here.
The mood after the meeting was hardly one of optimism, but both von der Leyen and Michel said they felt heard after the summit and that Xi and other top officials are now clear on what Brussels sees as the problems in their relationship.
Von der Leyen said the two sides had an "intense discussion on the topic of trade imbalance and the root causes," citing in part a slowdown in the Chinese economy that is reducing domestic demand and prompting Chinese companies to divert their products to the European market.
The EU officials said before the sit-down that Brussels planned to focus on Ukraine and would continue to back Kyiv even if American support fades or stops altogether. Von der Leyen said they pressed China to use its influence to bring Moscow to the negotiating table.
However, given post-summit comments by Wang Lutong, the director general of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's European Department, those calls didn't seem to make much headway.
"Sometimes European politicians say to us that China needs to speak to Russia, you need to speak to President Putin about withdrawing their soldiers," he said. "This is a very independent, sovereign nation. President Putin is making his decision based on his own national interest and security."
2. Lukashenka's China Trip
A few days before the EU's top brass arrived in Beijing, Xi hosted Belarussian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka to strengthen "political mutual trust and international coordination," according to Chinese state media.
What You Need To Know: Lukashenka, of course, is a staunch ally of Putin, and Belarus has supported Russia amid its war in Ukraine. Belarus was a staging ground for Moscow's full-scale invasion and a Yale University study published in November reported that Belarus also has facilitated "Russia's systematic effort to identify, collect, transport, and re-educate Ukraine's children" during the war.
Lukashenka was in Beijing in October for Xi's Belt and Road Forum and previously had a bilateral visit with the Chinese leader in February.
Like with that visit in February, Lukashenka was once again courting Chinese investment, which once flowed into the country but has generally stalled due to Western sanctions and Minsk's poor relations with the EU, which have limited its appeal to Beijing as a transit hub between China and the bloc.
Lukashenka left with no formal agreements.
Xi was quoted as saying by the official Xinhua News Agency that China "opposes external interference in Belarus's internal affairs" and that both leaders "also exchanged views on the Ukraine crisis," although no details were offered.
3. Blocked
Protesters with relatives imprisoned in Xinjiang through the western Chinese province's vast internment system targeting Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs, and other Muslim minorities were blocked from approaching the Chinese consulate in Almaty, RFE/RL's Kazakh Service reported.
What It Means: The relatives are part of a small group that has been picketing the consulate for years, calling for the release of their family members and protesting against Beijing's policies that led to an internment camp system in Xinjiang.
The protesters have faced pressure before, with some members being arrested and stopped by attending rallies or events in the past. They had planned to picket the Chinese Consulate on December 4, which they said was their 1,000th day of gathering, but were blocked by police when approaching.
Across The Supercontinent
In Custody: Russia's FSB said its officers arrested a Belarusian citizen on December 9 who it says is responsible for bombing railway connections linking Russia to China in the country's Far East in late November.
Hacked?: The cybersecurity platform Hacker News reported that the Uzbek Foreign Ministry's servers came under an attack in early December through a "remote access Trojan" program called SugarGh0st RAT, which they say is linked to China and used similar code used by Chinese actors in the past.
Winter Virus: Kazak health officials are moving to stamp out rumors spreading online that a respiratory illness spiking in China has spread across the border to Kazakhstan.
Zaure Akhmetova, Kazakhstan's deputy chair of the Committee for Sanitary and Epidemiological Control, said the government has no data supporting this and that the virus suspected for the growing case load in China contains "neither new nor unknown pathogens."
New Targets: Faced with slow growth, Reuters reported that China's leaders met for a closed-door meeting this week to discuss economic targets and map out stimulus plans for 2024.
One Thing To Watch
It's become something of a tradition for Xi and Putin to hold a virtual meeting in December, and they often tend to show where the strategic winds for Beijing and Moscow are blowing for the upcoming year.
In 2021, the two leaders had a 90-minute call, setting in place much of the agreements and rhetoric that would later form the basis of the "no limits" partnership that they announced in February 2022 at the Beijing Olympics. The following December, Xi seemed to double down on that sentiment despite fallout from Moscow's invasion, saying that "China is ready to work with Russia and all progressive forces around the world that oppose hegemonism and power politics."
What will be the focus of this year's call?
That's all from me for now. Don't forget to send me any questions, comments, or tips that you might have.
Until next time,
Reid Standish
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