Beyond the guest list—what Russia and China really want from each other

To see past the official agenda, you just have to look at the guest list. When the US president visited, he brought tech and finance executives. Putin’s massive delegation, however, includes five deputy prime ministers, eight ministers, regional governors, and the head of Russia’s central bank.

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For Russia, China has become a critical economic lifeline. With bilateral trade topping 200 billion dollars for three straight years, Moscow is structurally dependent on Beijing for industrial machinery, electronics, and cars.

With major Russian banks cut off from Western financial systems, trade settlements in Chinese Yuan have exploded from less than 2% in 2022 to almost 30 to 40% of Russia's total trade.

Beijing, on the other hand, is buying record amounts of discounted Russian oil, over 100 million tonnes a year. At the same time, Xi is pushing for a massive new gas pipeline, the Power of Siberia 2. The maths is simple: the Chinese leader wants cheap Russian raw materials, but he cannot risk Western penalties blocking Chinese exports to valuable European markets.

However, it is worth looking who else was on the plane. Notably, Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s Direct Investment Fund and Kremlin's key negotiator with Washington, hoping to leverage China’s diplomatic weight to wind down the invasion of Ukraine.

For Beijing, it is all about the Taiwan Card. By showing Washington how close it can get to Moscow, China is pressuring Trump to limit US multi-billion-dollar arms sales to Taiwan.

Putin and Xi have met more than 40 times and openly call each other old friends. If Europe is just waiting for these two to retire, there is bad news. Last year, a hot mic caught them discussing living till 150.

Maybe that will be just enough time for Europe to finally decide on its stance; and if not, to learn Mandarin.

Watch the Euronews video in the player above for the full story.