On 3 and 4 July, Chinese president Xi Jinping visited Russia for a two-day state visit that included his third meeting with Russian president Vladimir Putin in the space of a year.
Despite what these visits and the pledge to forge closer strategic and economic ties between the two nations suggest – and much to the chagrin of Vladimir Putin – Russia features awkwardly little in China’s major strategic plans for Eurasia, writes Sijbren de Jong in his column for EUobserver.
The full text can be read here.
Photo: en.kremlin.ru