It has been several years since the implementation of Russia's "Look East" strategy, and the economic and trade cooperation between China and Russia is constantly strengthening
The first aspect: the top priorities of China and Russia have changed, and new problems have emerged in the payment of financial transactions between the two countries. According to the Russian side, starting in January 2024, three Chinese banks informed Russian customers that they had decided to stop accepting payments from sanctioned Russian financial institutions. As for the simple reason, it is the impact of the Ukrainian crisis. After the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine conflict in 2022, the United States asked all countries around the world to stop their contacts with Russia and cut off financial cooperation with Russia, which led to some banking institutions choosing to terminate financial cooperation with Russia in order to avoid being affected by US sanctions, which caused a huge impact on the economic and trade cooperation between the two sides. This time, it was reported that the Bank of China had stopped accepting payments from Russian financial institutions, and many Westerners believed that this would have a huge impact on Sino-Russian economic and trade cooperation that had just entered rapid development. In response to the above-mentioned financial payment problems, Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui bluntly said that the above situation occurred because some countries have created problems for Sino-Russian cooperation, but China and Russia will find a way to solve these problems.
Everyone knows exactly who these countries are, and even if the three Chinese banks really stop cooperating with Russian financial institutions, it will not have much impact on Sino-Russian economic and trade cooperation. Ambassador Zhang Hanhui clearly pointed out that the proportion of RMB in Sino-Russian economic and trade cooperation is expanding, and the ruble is also joining the first settlement system of the two countries, and the cooperation and contact between enterprises of the two countries will be smoother and more convenient. Just last year, the total economic and trade volume between China and Russia exceeded 240 billion US dollars, setting a new record. This means that even if those international payment systems are not used, the ** of China and Russia will not be affected too much, and the payment problem between Chinese banks and Russian financial institutions is just a small episode, and the impact is not large.
The second aspect: Russia wants to create a new system of financial settlements. At the BRICS meeting held in Brazil, Russia's Siluanov put forward such a proposal, and the BRICS countries should work together to create a new settlement system independent of the Western financial system to ensure that the BRICS countries are free from political interference. However, so far, neither India nor Brazil has made any response on this matter, and it is clear that they still need to think about this proposal of Russia for a while. The main reason why Russia wants to establish an independent financial settlement system is that Russia was kicked out of the SWIFT payment system by the United States and Western countries, which led to a huge impact on the Russian economy. If it were not for the timely assistance of the BRICS members and the close and legitimate economic and trade cooperation with Russia without violating the UN Charter and international law, I am afraid that Russia's domestic economic system would have collapsed long ago. And in a sense, Russia's proposal is specifically for China, after all, some time ago, the proportion of RMB in global payments increased to 8%, which shows that only China, the world's second largest economy, has the ability and potential to build a new independent settlement system.
The third aspect: what Putin wants, will China give? The establishment of a new financial settlement system mentioned earlier belongs to one of Russia's visions, and it is also a vision of Russia to unite China and Russia to fight the West. Over the past year, the cooperative relations between China and Russia in the economic, political, and military fields have been continuously upgraded, and the comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination in the new era is being deepened and strengthened. Russia very much wants to cooperate with China in all aspects, and the most important thing is to work together to resist the pressure of the West. In the view of many Russian experts, if Russia is defeated, then the next target of the West will definitely be China, so China should take advantage of the current situation to fully cooperate with Russia and form a new "group" to counter the offensive actions of the United States and Western countries. However, as Foreign Minister Wang Yi has stressed on many public occasions, China-Russia relations are based on non-alignment, non-confrontation and non-targeting of any third party. In other words, China will continue to adhere to the attitude and position of "objective neutrality" and will not take the initiative to intervene in the geopolitical game between Russia and the West. Therefore, Russia's long-awaited vision of putting China and Russia on an alliance is doomed to fail.