China wages war against Ukraine from the shadows
Beijing is accused of working and supplying ‘Chinese-made attack and surveillance drones’ to Russia
China has increasingly become a crucial combatant in Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine. Last week, reports surfaced that Chinese “drone experts” were allegedly helping the sanctioned Russian arms manufacturer, IEMZ Kupol.
Documents and two officials also revealed that “Chinese-made attack and surveillance drones” were sent to Russia “via an intermediary,” Reuters news agency pointed out. China’s Foreign Ministry responded by saying it was “unaware of the collaboration.”
“In September last year, Reuters documented that Kupol had developed a new drone, the Garpiya-3 in China with the help of local specialists,” the news agency said.
“Now we have specific details of the extensive involvement of Chinese experts in tests and technological work on military-use drones inside Russia,” Reuters stressed.
Too often China stays silent … [It] could compel Moscow to end the invasion.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky
Behind the news:
- Without President Xi Jinping’s “no limits partnership” with Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2022, the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine would have collapsed.
- Instead, it has dragged on into a fourth year as Moscow resorts to pulverizing Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities near the front line with swarms of suicide drones.
Delve deeper: Since then, the Pact of Steel 2.0 has strengthened. In July, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the European Union’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, that Beijing did not want to see a Russian defeat in Ukraine.
Between the lines: Wang confirmed that China “feared the United States would then shift its whole focus” to Beijing’s rapid military build-up around Taiwan, the South China Sea and the broader Indo-Pacific region.
Big picture: Yet China had already been accused of propping up Russia’s crumbling economy and using its industrial might to keep Moscow’s war machine running.
Bottom line: “If [it] truly wanted this war to stop, it could compel Moscow to end the invasion. Without China, Putin’s Russia is nothing,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky told the United Nations Security Council last week.
China Factor comment: Zelensky then went on to underline his point. “Too often China stays silent and distant instead of active [in pursuit of] peace.” The silence from Comrade Xi and his Communist Party gang is truly deafening.