Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images/FILE
Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) greets Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) during their bilateral meeting November 13, 2019 in Brasilia, Brazil.
CNN –
Bilateral trade between Russia and China totaled more than $93.8 billion in January-May 2023, up 40.7% from the same period last year, data from China Customs Administration showed.
Data released on Wednesday also showed that China’s exports to Russia have reached $42.96 billion since January 2023, up 75.6% compared to 2022. Total trade value and total exports figures recorded their biggest jumps since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, with Russia becoming China’s fastest-growing trading partner in the world.
Russia has been hit by unprecedented Western sanctions and locked out of much of the world economy since invading Ukraine.
But China, which has declared “no borders” to its friendship with its northern neighbor, has assigned an economic lifeline to the Kremlin, thereby softening the impact of its exclusion from the global financial system.
Trade between China and other countries or regions has mostly declined compared to last year. Taiwan, South Korea, New Zealand and the US saw the largest declines globally, with Taiwan shrinking its trade with China by more than 25 percent. Trade between the US also shrank by 12.3 percent.
Last month, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said he expected trade between Russia and China to surpass $200 billion by 2023, CNN reported.
According to Portal, China’s Premier Li Qiang met with Mishustin in Beijing in May and said the country is ready to work with Russia to promote pragmatic cooperation in various fields and take it to a “new level”.
Mishustin, meanwhile, said the two governments are making “coordinated efforts” to implement at the “highest level” the agreements reached between China’s leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin at their meeting in March, according to the state-run Russian news agency TASS.