China and the Russian Invasion of Ukraine: What next?

On 24 February 2022, almost a year ago, Russia under Putin invaded Ukraine, after Putin visited Xi Jinping in Beijing at the opening of the Winter Games. At the Beijing summit, the two leaders declared a partnership without limits between China and Russia. Thus, despite the Chinese Government’s declaration of neutrality after Russia invaded Ukraine, few outside of China took its declaration of neutrality at face value. Whatever tacit understandings Xi might have reached with Putin, the military failure of Russia as well as the effective and heroic stand Ukraine has made took China by surprise. As we get close to the anniversary of the invasion, this panel will discuss what China, Russia and Ukraine want from each other and what direction of travel the War will take, including the prospect for a peaceful settlement. The panellists will preset the perspectives from China, Ukraine as well as Russia.

Panellists

• John Gittings began reporting from China in 1971 and was on the editorial staff of The Guardian for many years, where he was also foreign leader-writer. His books include Real China (1996), The Changing Face of China (2005), and The Glorious Art of Peace (2012), and he continues to work on China and on peace history. He is a Research Associate at the China Institute, SOAS, London University.

• Dr. Yevheniia Hobova is a fellow at the A. Yu. Krymskiy Institute of Oriental Studies, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and a member of the Ukrainian Association of Sinologists. Her research focuses on language policies and strategies, political discourse and Sinophone media analysis. She has published widely on these topics in Chinese, English, and Ukrainian journals, as well as doing literary translations of Chinese literature in Ukrainian (including Lu Yu and Wang Meng).

• Dr Marcin Kaczmarski is Lecturer in Security Studies in the School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Glasgow. In his research, Marcin focuses on Russia-China relations, Russia’s foreign policy, great-power regionalism and the role of domestic politics in foreign policy. He is the author of Russia-China relations in the post-crisis international order (Routledge 2015) and published articles in leading academic journals, including International Affairs, Survival, International Politics, Europe-Asia Studies, and Problems of Post-Communism. Marcin was a visiting scholar at the Chengchi University in Taiwan, the Slavic-Eurasian Research Center in Japan, the Aleksanteri Institute in Finland, the Kennan Institute in Washington, DC, and the Shanghai International Studies University in China.

Recording

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Registration

This online panel discussion will take place online via Zoom. 

Chair: Professor Steve Tsang (Director, SOAS China Institute)

Organiser: SOAS China Institute

Contact email: sci@soas.ac.uk

Photo credit: Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona on Unsplash