“We firmly oppose illegal sanctions or long-arm jurisdiction against China citing China-Russia cooperation,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told reporters Monday. “If the report you cited is true, the EU move will erode mutual trust and cooperation with China and sharpen division and confrontation in the world, which is extremely dangerous.
China has loomed as an untapped reserve of diplomatic and military power on the margins of the war in Ukraine. Chinese General Secretary Xi Jinping appeared to give “tacit approval” to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s campaign to overthrow the Ukrainian government, as part of a broader drive for their envisioned “transformation of the global governance architecture and world order,” but Beijing seems to have stopped short of sending lethal aid directly to the Russian military.