China’s Xi Warns Putin Not to Use Nuclear Weapons in Ukraine

By Geoffrey Smith

Investing.com — Chinese President Xi Jinping explicitly warned Russia against the use of nuclear weapons in Ukraine Friday, one of the clearest signs yet of China’s unease at a conflict started by its most important strategic partner.

The international community must “jointly oppose the use of, or threats to use, nuclear weapons,” according to a statement published by the official Chinese news agency Xinhua on Friday.

“Nuclear weapons cannot be used, a nuclear war cannot be waged, in order to prevent a nuclear crisis” in Europe or Asia, he added.

The comments are the clearest warning yet to Russian President Vladimir Putin against further escalating a conflict that is increasingly turning against Russia on the battlefield, despite Russia’s formal decision to annex four regions of eastern and southern Ukraine at the start of October. Ukrainian forces have made steady advances in the southern region of Kherson in recent weeks, forcing the Russian occupation administration to evacuate from the region’s capital city in anticipation of an assault.

Western nations have also kept up the flow of financial and military aid to Ukraine, thwarting Putin’s plans to sow division by cutting off gas supplies to western Europe.

At the time of the annexation, Putin had said he would use “every available means” to defend its Ukrainian conquests, irrespective of the lack of international recognition for the move. Since then, various news reports have suggested concrete discussions by the Russian military about how and in what circumstances a tactical nuclear device could be used in Ukraine, albeit without Putin’s participation. Under Russian law, Putin is the only person allowed to order a nuclear strike.

The statement came during an official visit to Beijing by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and represents something of a diplomatic coup for Scholz, whose economy has been hurt harder than any other by Russia’s gas blockade harder. Europe’s largest economy is sliding into recession as sky-high energy prices make much of its manufacturing base unprofitable. The same energy issues are swallowing up German – and more broadly, European – disposable income.

Those developments have worrying implications for China too, given its economic dependence on exports to western markets. China’s own growth has slowed well below the official 5.5% target this year, with expanding only 3.9% on the year in the third quarter.

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