Ukrainian officials scrambled to assure the Chinese communist government on Thursday that Kyiv would protect Chinese assets in the country following a Russian missile attack on the city of Odessa that damaged its Chinese consulate.
The assurances of safety for Chinese activities in the country were made in a seemingly unrelated meeting between Ukrainian and Chinese trade officials intended to discuss the expansion of Chinese economic activity in the war-torn country. While China is one of Russia’s top allies on the geopolitical stage and has studiously avoided condemning Moscow’s decision to invade Ukraine formally in February 2022, Beijing actively pursues business dealings with Ukraine. Ukraine is a longtime member of China’s predatory Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), in which China offers predatory loans to poor countries meant to build infrastructure projects, and President Volodymyr Zelensky has invited Chinese businesses to invest in the rebuilding of post-war Ukraine.
Zelensky has also made moves to protect his country’s economy from Chinese hegemony, most prominently nationalizing a critical jet engine manufacturer to prevent a Chinese takeover and cutting deals with South Korean corporate giants Samsung and Hyundai for post-war reconstruction. On Thursday, however, Ukrainian trade representatives expressed eagerness to see more Chinese economic activity in the country.
According to the Chinese government-run Global Times, the meeting on Thursday took place between a Chinese vice minister of commerce, Ling Ji, and Taras Kachka, a deputy trade minister from Ukraine who was in Beijing for meetings. Kachka’s visit was a planned follow-up to Zelensky’s phone conversation with genocidal Chinese dictator Xi Jinping in April.
“China is willing to establish a cooperative relationship between the investment promotion agencies of the two countries while continually expanding trade and investment cooperation,” the Global Times paraphrased Ling as saying.
#Chinese and # Ukrainian commerce officials met in Beijing on Thursday, vowing to actively develop mutually beneficial trade cooperation while expressing willingness to expand imports of high-quality products from Ukraine. https://t.co/UWUeQ5RFJm
— Global Times (@globaltimesnews) July 20, 2023
Ling also reportedly emphasized the need for Ukraine to “effectively safeguard the safety of personnel and assets of Chinese enterprises and protect the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies in the country.”
Kachka reportedly responded to the pressure to offer security to Chinese companies, even as Ukraine struggles to confront a full-scale invasion of its territory, by assuring Beijing that “will strengthen security measures to protect Chinese companies operating in Ukraine, and is willing to work together with China to promote the healthy and sustainable development of economic and trade relations.”
The Ukrainian officials noted Kyiv’s participation in the BRI and claimed the country is enthusiastic about aiding China in “jointly building” the program.
The meeting addressed the presence of Chinese businesses in the country, not the Chinese government, but in a communist system, private industry does not exist – all Chinese companies, and especially those with access to international markets, maintain friendly ties and are influenced by the Communist Party. The timing occurred immediately after, however, a Chinese government asset became collateral damage in a Russian attack.
The governor of Odessa, home to the eponymous key port city on the Black Sea, confirmed on Thursday that Russian rocket attacks on the city resulted in damage to the Chinese consulate.
“We see the destruction of a civilian building, and the buildings around it are also damaged. The building of the Chinese Consulate-General in Odessa was also damaged,” the head of the Odessa Regional Military Administration Oleh Kiper said, according to the Ukrainian state outlet Ukrinform.
Ukrainian authorities reportedly documented 19 cruise missiles and 19 drones attacking both Odessa and Mykolaiv on Thursday, killing at least two and injuring 20 people.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry confirmed the report but claimed the consulate sustained only minor damage.
“An explosion happened near China’s Consulate-General in Odessa. The blast wave shook off parts of the wall surface and windowpanes. The consulate staff had long left the premises and no one was hurt,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. “China is closely following the developments and staying in touch with the parties concerned. We will take all measures necessary to keep Chinese institutions and nationals safe in Ukraine.”
The Beijing meeting on expanding Chinese business activity in Ukraine followed a high-profile visit to Kyiv by South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol – the first by a South Korean president to a war zone that the country is not active in – last week. Yoon, a conservative, offered Zelensky opportunities to sign agreements with Korean corporations to build infrastructure projects destroyed by the Russian invasion, apparently directly encroaching into BRI territory. Zelensky praised Yoon for helping invest in buildings for social services and rehabilitation post-war.
“This is also the rebuilding of infrastructure in Ukraine: schools, hospitals, housing, enterprises, everything destroyed by Russian missiles and enemy artillery. Thank you for your willingness to support our education system,” Zelensky told Yoon, according to his presidential office. “We need a new large-scale rehabilitation industry. I invited the Republic of Korea to show leadership in creating rehabilitation centers in Ukraine.”
“Of course, we also discussed economic cooperation — this includes energy, railways, and transport in general, the creation of production facilities in Ukraine, local content, as well as the macro-financial sphere,” Zelensky continued. “We definitely have something to do together in each of these areas.”
According to South Korean media, Hyundai made the biggest agreement with Ukraine, offering joint projects for “high-speed railways, national infrastructure, and energy-related projects,” the Korea JoongAng Daily reported.
The Global Times looked unfavorably onto Yoon’s visit, condemning the South Korean leader for “securing a piece of the pie during future post-war reconstruction in Ukraine” and seeing opportunities for Korea in future projects there. The Chinese state newspaper looked unfavorably upon Yoon’s visit resulting in deals between major Korean companies and the Ukrainian government, and Zelensky openly stating that Korea was welcome to invest.
Zelensky has repeatedly made similar offers to China, however. In August 2022, speaking to the South China Morning Post, Zelensky expressed hope that “Chinese businesses” would be interested in reconstructing Ukraine.
“I really would like the whole world to [unite] over this process. It’s very hard for us to overcome this,” he said.
Zelensky also urged China to convince Russia to cease its hostilities.
“It’s a very powerful state. It’s a powerful economy … So (it) can politically, economically influence Russia. And China is [also a] permanent member of the U.N. Security Council,” the newspaper quoted Zelensky as saying. “This is a war on our territory, they came to invade. China, as a big and powerful country, could come down and sort of put the Russian Federation [in] a certain place.”
On the anniversary of Russia’s “special operation” to occupy Ukraine, the Chinese Communist Party issued a “peace plan” to end the war featuring vague advice such as urging both sides to “calm down as soon as possible.” Xi Jinping, following a conversation with Zelensky in April, sent a delegation to both Ukraine and Russia in May urging roundtable discussions on the invasion. Neither country has addressed the plan with any seriousness, accusing each other of not being in a position for political dialogue given the ongoing hostilities.
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