Chinese citizens are fighting for Russia — Vitaly Portnikov's column

The President of Ukraine confirmed this and added that many other Chinese citizens are also fighting in Russian units on Ukrainian territory. Of course, unlike North Korea, China does not send regular troops to the Russian-Ukrainian front. Still, it’s worth noting that Pyongyang has never officially admitted the presence of its soldiers in Russian ranks — and even tried to change the documents of DPRK citizens serving in Russian military units or fighting alongside them.

But the fact that Chinese citizens are fighting for Russia as mercenaries could turn into a serious diplomatic issue for Beijing, which constantly claims to be neutral in the war and regularly accuses the West of fueling the conflict by sending weapons to Ukraine.

Interestingly, reports about the capture of Chinese nationals also appeared in Chinese media. At least, the South China Morning Post — China’s main English-language outlet aimed at a Western audience and reflecting official Beijing’s stance from Hong Kong — published a detailed piece on the story, quoting Volodymyr Zelenskyy. So it’s clear that China probably won’t be able to pretend it didn’t see the news about its citizens fighting in the Russian army.

Although there has been no response yet from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China, it’s clear that if any reaction comes at all, it will appear soon and will be carefully coordinated through official Chinese channels.

It’s likely that Beijing will stress it has nothing to do with the decision of Chinese citizens to fight in the Russian army. They’ll try to frame these individuals as mercenaries who joined the Russian armed forces on their own. However, we’re talking about people who can give direct testimony to investigators — testimony that will cover their involvement in Russia’s military. And that alone could be an unpleasant surprise for China’s leadership.

So, the capture of Chinese military personnel might actually push Beijing to speak more clearly about peaceful solutions to the Russian-Ukrainian war — though under the pretense of maintaining a neutral position. Still, the fact that Chinese citizens are fighting for Russia complicates the picture far more than Beijing would like.

Obviously, this could also trigger a serious decline in China–Ukraine relations and potentially lead to a complete freeze in official contact between Beijing and the office of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

From the perspective of how Chinese President Xi Jinping sees the world, Zelenskyy — regardless of the fact that Chinese citizens were captured — should not have made this public. Instead, he should have first opened dialogue with the relevant institutions — namely, the Chinese Embassy in Ukraine and China’s Foreign Ministry.

By going public with the news that Chinese nationals were captured by the Ukrainian army, Zelenskyy has likely ended any chance of direct dialogue with Xi Jinping. The Chinese leader will see this as a move that put him in a difficult spot and conclude that Zelenskyy is not someone he can continue personal contact with.

Diplomatic ties between the Ukrainian and Chinese foreign ministries will also likely be frozen soon precisely because Kyiv caught Beijing red-handed and told the entire world about it.

But in Washington, this report about Chinese military involvement in Russia’s war against Ukraine on Moscow’s side might be seen more positively against the backdrop of the new trade war kicking off between the United States and the People's Republic of China. And it could lead to a much hotter and more serious conflict than even the direct participants in this clash might expect.

Maybe now Ukraine will be able to convince the Donald Trump administration that the Russian-Ukrainian war is part of a much bigger global standoff and that the leadership of the People's Republic of China, unlike the leadership of the United States, understands full well that this is a global conflict, where Beijing and Moscow are partners in a joint effort to weaken the position of the collective West.

Even if the Trump administration doesn’t see the U.S. as part of that collective West, it can’t ignore the fact that for both China and Russia, the U.S. very much remains a central figure in it. So any attempts by Washington to strike a deal with Moscow and push Russia out of China’s orbit are classic Trumpian illusions — ones that will crash and burn just like many of Trump’s other foreign policy experiments.

And to avoid that crash, maybe it’s time the American president started looking at the real world more clearly. The presence of Chinese military personnel fighting alongside Putin’s army is a pretty good wake-up call for Washington to start taking this reality seriously and to understand that helping Ukraine in its war with Russia isn’t just about supporting a country trying to survive and secure a just peace, at least for the coming years.

It’s also about backing those who are standing up to the joint push by Russia and China to boost their influence in Europe at the direct expense of both U.S. interests and those of the EU itself.

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About the author. Vitaly Portnikov, journalist, National Shevchenko Prize laureate

The editorial staff does not always share the opinions expressed by the blog authors.