China is politically benefited by West's defeat - Center for Middle East Studies

He said this on Espreso TV.

"China's strategy is clear. While the United States is an enemy, not a partner, China's key task is to tear Europe away from the United States as much as possible. Therefore, the route of Chinese President Xi Jinping's visit to Europe was quite eloquent. In other words, France is campaigning for a stronger role for Europe in the context of the possible rise to power of Donald Trump, who is engaged in isolationism. And this plays into China's hands. Another thing is that in return, Europeans would like to see some shifts in China's position. So far, we have not seen this, or at least from what we know, we have not heard it," he said.

“China will try to separate politics from the economy. However, the United States will probably try to convince Xi Jinping that further rapprochement with Russia will be harmful,” Semyvolos said.

"China remains in its position. We did not hear any changes publicly, during the meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron," he said. “This means that China will try to separate politics from the economy. To what extent it will succeed is a big question, especially now. We see that the US is already imposing new sanctions and then introducing new customs rules for Chinese products. There are also indirect sanctions that apply to Chinese banks working with Russia. We have already seen some effect. As for the strategy of interaction with China, on the one hand, it is the introduction of indirect sanctions, and on the other hand, it is an attempt to convince Xi Jinping that further rapprochement with Moscow will only harm Chinese interests," he added.

• The Kremlin press service said that Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit China at the invitation of President Xi Jinping on May 16-17.