North Korea’s troop deployment to Russia jeopardizes China’s balancing act

Washington — Several of Beijing’s leading trading partners are urging Chinese President Xi Jinping to do more to pressure North Korea to stop or reverse its deployment of troops to Russia, where more than 10,000 North Korean soldiers have joined the front lines in the war against Ukraine. 

The appeals at the past week’s twin summits in Brazil and Peru reflect the awkward position in which the Chinese leader finds himself as he attempts a delicate balancing act between Russia and the West.  

At a joint press conference with Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva in Brasilia on Thursday, Xi called for bringing together “more voices of peace” in Ukraine. He pushed for a six-point consensus on Ukraine first put forward by China and Brazil in May that stresses dialogue and negotiations leading to a political settlement.  

Before his bilateral meeting in the Brazilian capital, Xi was told by world leaders on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro and the APEC summit in Lima, Peru, that Beijing needs to persuade North Korea to stop sending more troops to fight for Russia.  

German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz warned Xi on Tuesday at the G20 that the deployment of North Korea troops to fight against Ukraine amounted to an escalation of the war. 

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol asked Xi last week at APEC to play a “constructive” role on North Korea’s deepening ties with Russia. Yoon used the global gatherings as an opportunity to consolidate the West’s condemnation of Pyongyang-Moscow military ties. 

U.S. President Joe Biden also told Xi at APEC that Beijing has influence and capacity to prevent the conflict in Ukraine from expanding through the presence of more North Korean troops, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said at a press briefing Sunday. 

Biden pointed out China’s position calling for the de-escalation of the conflict and said the presence of North Korean troops runs counter to that stance.  

Balancing act 

China has been reluctant to call out North Korean leader Kim Jong Un for providing troops and munitions to help Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war efforts.  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned Tuesday that North Korea could deploy up to 100,000 soldiers, and the U.S. estimates that about 11,000 North Korean troops have been mobilized in the Russian border region of Kursk. 

“Beijing currently finds itself in a tricky situation,” said Patricia Kim, a fellow at Brookings Institution where she leads the Global China Project.  

“It is uncomfortable with North Korea’s growing military cooperation with Russia that has extended into the Ukrainian battlefield. Putin is now indebted to Kim, and this may embolden Pyongyang to engage in risky behavior at home that can have blowback effects on China,” she told VOA. 

“At the same time, Beijing believes it cannot afford to alienate Pyongyang or Moscow, especially as the potential for a U.S.-China confrontation grows with [President-elect Donald Trump’s] return to office,” she said. 

Despite the discomfort, it is unlikely that Xi will confront Moscow or Pyongyang about sending more North Korean troops, said Bonnie Glaser, managing director of the Indo-Pacific program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. 

Glaser suggested that China is less concerned about the North Korean troops in Russia than about responses by the U.S., Japan and South Korea that could “negatively impact Chinese interests.” 

Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, told VOA on Wednesday that China’s position on both Ukraine and the Korean Peninsula remains “consistent,” and that Beijing has been “making efforts toward de-escalation of the situation” in Ukraine. 

While being silent on North Korean troops, China is accused of providing dual-use goods that Russia needs to produce weapons. The European Union has also warned Beijing that the attack drones that Russia is producing in China’s Xinjiang Province would have consequences. 

China has been trying to support Russia’s war in Ukraine without angering the West out of concern over any economic backlash it could trigger — including trade restrictions and sanctions that could further cripple its struggling economy, analysts said.  

“China is skilled at playing this role” of ambiguity, “given its history of nonalignment, while knowing its economy relies on good trade relations with the U.S. and the EU,” said Joseph DeTrani, who served as the special envoy for six-party denuclearization talks that included North Korea and China, from 2003 to 2006.  

“China appears reluctant to use its limited leverage with North Korea due, in part, to the tension in the U.S.-China relations,” he said.  

At the same time, DeTrani said, the Chinese president will not openly support Russia’s war for fear that would undermine his government’s credibility with the Global South, where Xi is trying “to prove that China’s system of governance is far superior to the liberal democracy in the U.S.” 

In October, the U.S. sanctioned Chinese companies for directly helping Russia build long-range attack drones. In response, China’s Foreign Ministry urged the U.S. to stop using the Ukraine issue to “smear or put pressure” on China.

Aligned against US 

Richard Weitz, senior fellow and director at the Center for Political-Military Analysis at the Hudson Institute, said China views its partnership with Russia as more important than any differences it has over North Korea.  

China does not “want to antagonize Russia” over North Korea,” he said. 

“Despite their differences on particular issues,” including North Korea, “they are fundamentally aligned globally against the U.S. and the Western order. So, they’re not going to let these specific differences over narrower issues interfere with that global alignment,” said Weitz. 

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said at a meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Brazil on Monday that Beijing is ready to cooperate closely with Russia within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, according to Russian news agency TASS. 

They also stressed the importance of strengthening foreign policy coordination between Moscow and Beijing at international venues, including the U.N., BRICS and the G20, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday. 

“By failing to condemn Russian aggression, China threw away any claim to neutrality,” said John Erath, senior policy director at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation.  

“It is unlikely, however, that Beijing believes Russia-DPRK [North Korea] military cooperation to be in its interest. If China has objected to the partnership, it does not seem to have produced much of an effect on Putin or Kim,” said Erath.
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