Xi-Putin meet next week to boost alliance
November 2, 2014, 8:03 am

Xi has held talks or met with Putin for nine times since he assumed the office of China’s President in March 2013 [PPIO]

Russian and Chinese Presidents Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping will hold bilateral talks on the sidelines of the APEC Leaders Summit which will be held in Beijing from Nov. 7-11. This will be the 5th Xi-Putin meeting in 2014.

Xi will also meet US President Barack Obama during the APEC Summit. China’s burgeoning trade and investment treaties within Asia Pacific is increasing its influence in the region while challenging US hegemony.

China’s alliance with Russia and increasing overtures towards South Korea come in the backdrop of the much-hyped US Asia Pivot policy.

Xi has held talks or met with Putin for nine times since he assumed the office of China’s President in March 2013.

Despite a gloomy global economy, the trade volume between Russia and China surged last year, nearing the target of $100 billion set for 2015, said Putin.

The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) and the Russia-China Investment Fund (RCIF) are working on infrastructure projects related to China’s revival of the “Silk Road”.

The two countries signed over 40 agreements during the 19th China-Russia Prime Ministers’ meet in Moscow last month.

The Prime Ministers summit this year follows successful meetings between President Xi Jinping and Putin where the two leaders have overseen enormous Sino-Russian joint ventures, including a landmark $400 billion gas deal in Shanghai after a decade-long gas supply talks between the two countries.

Russia also plans to sign a new 30-year gas supply contract with China via the western route. Putin also welcomed Chinese investors joining the strategic Vankor oil project in Siberia.

“Vankor is one of the biggest production operations today and very promising. Overall, we take a cautious approach to letting in our foreign partners, but we of course set no restrictions for our Chinese friends,” said Putin.

During the BRICS Summit earlier this year, the Chinese President said Beijing is “true in word and resolute in deed” in ties with Moscow, while pushing for intensifying “political support to each other”.

The Chinese President’s support to Putin comes in the backdrop of the severe sanctions against Russia announced by Western economies over the turmoil in Ukraine.

“I want to make it clear that China categorically opposes the sanctions the United States and Western countries have taken against Russia. China categorically opposes colour revolutions and attempts to hold back Russia’s development,” said the Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli in September in Moscow.

Putin said earlier this year that the Sino-Russian ties, including those on approaches to international problems, are at an unprecedented level.

“As for our relations with China’s People’s Republic, they develop successfully and are at an unprecedentedly high level – both at the level of trust and the level of cooperation. I mean also the political sphere, our common approaches to estimations of international situations and to security in the world,” he said during a Q&A session in April in Moscow.

Russia’s trade turnover with China is almost thrice as big as that with the US.

“It is absolutely clear that we will be expanding collaboration with China. Our trade with the United States is 27.5 [billion], but trade with China is 87 billion, and it is growing. And experts will agree that China is gradually becoming the number one economic power. The question is when it will happen: in 15, 20 or 25 years. But everybody understands that it is inevitable,” asserted Putin.

The Russian and Chinese central banks have signed a massive currency swap deal worth $24.4 billion for three years, which will allow them to increase trade in domestic currencies and cut the dependence on the US dollar in bilateral payments.

In September, Moscow and Beijing have entered into a pact to boost use of the rouble and yuan for trade transactions.

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) is a forum for 21 Pacific Rim member economies that seeks to promote free trade and economic cooperation throughout the Asia-Pacific region.

TBP