China still actively helping Russia in war, says Zelenskyy
Ukraine has "clear" intelligence that China is still actively helping the Russian military in the war, said President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during his speech at the meeting of the European Council.
"Putin wants to match the level of arms production of your countries by next year. And he receives help from the DPRK with weapons and now even with people. Plus Iran. Unfortunately, we are receiving signals that China is still actively helping Russia to drag this war on. We have clear intelligence data," Zelenskyy said.
China's position on the war in Ukraine
From the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, China did not want to publicly condemn the armed aggression of the Russian Federation. In March 2022, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi called Russia "Beijing's most important strategic partner."
After the imposition of international sanctions on the Russian Federation, Beijing became less willing to provide political and economic support to Moscow. However, this did not prevent China from diplomatically covering its partner and promoting Russia's narrative regarding its invasion of Ukraine in the state and foreign media.
In 2023, China proposed its own "peace plan". The leader of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, stated that "many provisions of the peace plan put forward by China are consistent with Russian approaches" and "can be taken as a basis for a peaceful settlement." The Ukrainian authorities replied that they did not agree with all the points, but noted at the time that China had at least started talking about Ukraine.
At the invitation of Beijing, the then-Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba paid a visit to China. However, the positions of the countries do not seem to have changed since then.
In September, China announced its intention to create the "Friends for Peace" platform, within which countries will contribute to the "political settlement" of the war in Ukraine.