The Xi-Putin Summit: A Display of Resilience at a Time of US Pressure

The two leaders have met more than 45 times—this being Xi’s 11th trip to Moscow.

A few key takeaways:

They dropped their insistence that their partnership was not an alliance. This has been in every statement since 2023.
The “no alliance” formulation is also missing from the PRC White Paper on National Security issued this month.
This omission is likely a deterrent move, to leave us all guessing about the parameters of their partnership.
Although a PRC honor guard marched in the Victory Day parade, it was North Korea, not China, that sent 13,000 troops to the Kursk front. However, it recently came to light that about 150 Chinese nationals are fighting for Russia in Ukraine. See my article on this, based on interviews from Chinese media and the Ukrainian government with some of these mercenaries: https://thediplomat.com/2025/05/the-chinese-mercenaries-fighting-russias-war-in-ukraine/
China and Russia continue to agree to disagree on many points—their latest joint statements lack detail on several key issues, such as the security of the Korean Peninsula and the Arctic.
Retired Senior Colonel Zhou Bo sums it up best, stating that China and Russia are “like two lines in parallel, that is, however close they are, they won’t meet to become an alliance.”
At the same time, the Sino-Russian partnership continues to deepen and we have seen an increase in military exercises, especially near the North Pacific Arctic.