By Globinsider.
The Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Nikolai Patrushev unexpectedly visited China shortly after the end of Shanghai Cooperation Summit held in Samarkand, Uzbekistan. As presidents of China and Russia met on the sidelines of the summit and held negotiations behind the closed door, the visit of Patrushev to China shortly after the SCO summit raises a very important question: what was the purpose of this visit?
Officially, Patrushev visits China to take part in the Russian-Chinese consultations on strategic security as well as in the meeting of the Russian-Chinese mechanism for law enforcement and security cooperation. But the timing of this visit is quite unusual.
In our opinion, there are at least three most likely reasons for this extraordinary visit by Patrushev:
1. One of the possible reasons for Patrushev’s unexpected trip is Moscow’s proposal to strengthen military-technical cooperation with Beijing against the background of military failures of the Russian army in Ukraine. As part of this veiled cooperation, Moscow might have asked Beijing for weapons and modern military equipment. However, it is unlikely that China will agree to supply arms to Russia, as this could create huge problems for it on the international arena. At the same time, such a request from Moscow has a very bad timing. China’s largest domestic political event, the Party Congress, will take place in October. On the other hand, it is possible that Russia will offer China freedom of action in Central Asia in exchange for arms supplies and security guarantees.
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2. Another possible reason for this visit is that Patrushev wants to present Beijing with a plan for a future change of power in Russia. With the situation in Ukraine deadlocked for the Kremlin’s planners, Moscow could have come up with some sort of additional plan and a new Russian presidential candidate. Before implementing this plan, Moscow would like to get assurances from Beijing that the new president will be approved by Xi Jinping and that all strategic cooperation arrangements, including gas deals between the two countries and security guarantees, will remain in place.
The first two explanations are based on hypothetical assumptions partly based on unchecked insider information as well as on the information spread via Ukrainian mass media.
There is also a third explanation for this visit, which is actively spread by the Russian media. According to Russian Sinologist Nikolai Vavilov, N. Patrushev’s visit is taking place in pursuance of the agreements reached following the visit of Li Zhanshu, the chief architect of the Russian-Chinese alliance from China, and the “usual meeting” on the sidelines of the SCO summit in Samarkand between V. Putin and Xi Jinping.
According to Vavilov, the main results of the Patrushev’s two day visit to China are as follows: 1) the continuation of regular patrolling and creation and development of “corridors” for trade traffic in the potential water area of the Taiwanese conflict (most of the trade between the two countries is still carried out by sea), 2) deepening of the coordination of the general staffs which might be helpful in the event of a conflict scenario.
The latter opinion is supported by Zhang Hong, a researcher at the Institute of Russian, Eastern Europe and Central Asia at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences who pointed out that Patrushev’s visit to China represents the strengthening of mutual trust, support and cooperation between China and Russia and implements the consensus reached by the two heads of state at the SCO Samarkand Summit.
Global News Insider 