Xi has made his choice: he is sticking with Vladimir Putin

Xi Jinping has made his choice. He is sticking with his ‘best friend’ Vladimir Putin, and no end of Russian atrocities or wishful thinking in the west is going to alter that. Their axis of autocracy presents a far-reaching challenge to western democracies, which the UK in particular is struggling to come to terms with.

There has been a chorus of western voices calling on China to act ‘responsibly’, exercise its influence with Putin, and generally live up to its supposed commitment to the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity. That will not happen. Those principles were always a myth, but fundamentally Xi and Putin have too much in common.

China’s state-owned media has continued to echo Moscow’s denials of war crimes. China’s tightly controlled social media has amplified claims that atrocities against civilians were staged. ‘After all, Zelensky is an actor,’ said Song Zhongping, a supposed academic and frequent media pundit, in one of a series of widely shared video clips.