MERICS EU-China Opinion Pool: The Russia factor in EU-China relations in 2023

As the Russian invasion of Ukraine enters its second year, Beijing continues to support Moscow. The European tour of the Chinese Communist Party’s top diplomat saw Wang Yi announce that China would table a proposal for resolving the conflict, highlighting that it will try to marry stabilizing relations with the EU with developing relations with Russia. The idea of separating EU-China relations from China-Russia ones has been tested by China’s new Ambassador to the EU, Fu Cong, over the last few weeks. In light of China’s diplomatic offensive, the EU needs strategic clarity on how its China policy should approach the Russia question.

In this round of MERICS’ EU-China opinion pool, MERICS Analyst Grzegorz Stec asked a number of experts: “A year into the war on Ukraine, how should the EU approach the Russia factor in its China policy in 2023?” Among the experts are:

• Alice Ekman, Senior Analyst heading Asia portfolio at the EUISS
• Alexander Gabuev, Senior Fellow, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
• Jakub Jakóbowski, Deputy Director at Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW)
• Una Bērziņa-Čerenkova, Head of the Asia program at the Latvian Institute of International Affairs and European China Policy Fellow at MERICS
• Yurii Poita, Head of the Asia-Pacific Section at the Kyiv-based Center for Army - Conversion and Disarmament Studies (CACDS) and European China Policy Fellow at MERICS
• Helena Legarda, Lead Analyst at MERICS
• Jean-Baptiste Monnier, Vice President, Asia Centre

Read the complete opinion pool on the MERICS website here