February 5, 2026
BEIJING – Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke separately with US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin within hours on Feb 4, setting the stage for the next high-level China-US leaders’ meeting in April, while long-time partners Beijing and Moscow reaffirmed the strength of their ties.
The calls also highlighted China’s parallel engagement with both Russia and the United States amid mounting pressure on Moscow over the war in Ukraine and the future of nuclear arms control.
Describing the call as “all very positive”, Mr Trump said on Truth Social the two leaders spoke on trade, military issues, Taiwan, the war in Ukraine and Iran, as well as his April trip to China which he “very much look forward to”.
He also said China had agreed to increase its purchases of US-produced soya beans.
“The relationship with China, and my personal relationship with President Xi, is an extremely good one, and we both realise how important it is to keep it that way.”
Meanwhile, Mr Xi said he is willing to continue working with Mr Trump to steer the “great ship of China-US relations through rough waters and move it forward steadily” to accomplish bigger and better things, according to state news agency Xinhua.
Mr Xi also reiterated China’s stance on Taiwan, saying in the call that “the US must handle arms sales to Taiwan with caution”, according to Xinhua.
In his video call with Mr Putin earlier on the same day, Mr Xi called for Russia and China to work out a “grand plan” to develop ties that he said were on the “right trajectory”, and that the international situation had grown “increasingly turbulent” since the start of the year, according to Xinhua.
Mr Putin described the relationship as exemplary and said that the foreign policy alliance between Russia and China remains an “important stabilising factor” amid growing global turbulence.
The call, which lasted 1½ hours, marked the first meeting between the two leaders in 2026, and came as Russia and Ukraine are in the midst of US-brokered peace talks in Abu Dhabi to end the nearly four-year war.
The calls coincided with the imminent expiry of Russia’s New START Treaty with the United States, a nuclear arms agreement signed in 2010 to limit both countries’ strategic nuclear arsenals. The pact is set to expire on Feb 5, with no signs of an extension, fuelling fears of a renewed arms race between the world’s two largest nuclear powers.
It also followed a series of recent engagements between Mr Xi and Western leaders, who have visited Beijing to boost and recalibrate ties with China, despite lingering differences over Russia’s war in Ukraine. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and British Prime Minister
Keir Starmer visited Beijing in January while German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is expected to travel to China later in February.
For years, European leaders have pressed China to use its influence to curb Moscow’s actions. Instead, China has emerged as a key economic lifeline by continuing to trade with Russia and increasing imports of Russian oil and gas, providing some relief from Western economic sanctions.
This has taken on renewed significance with Mr Trump saying that India would stop buying Russian oil, a claim New Delhi has not publicly confirmed, raising questions over whether China would remain Russia’s most important energy buyer.
Mr Putin, in the call with Mr Xi, reiterated that Russia is the leading energy supplier to China, and that the energy partnership is “mutually beneficial” and “truly strategic”.
Professor Wang Yiwei from Beijing’s Renmin University’s Institute of International Affairs said that China did not opportunistically increase purchases of Russian oil and gas in the wake of the Ukraine war, as major oil and gas pipeline agreements were planned and signed well before the conflict.
“The energy relationship between the two countries is structurally stable,” said Prof Wang, a former Chinese diplomat to the European Union.
“Even though US-Russia relations have somewhat improved after Trump returned to the White House, the institutionalised mechanisms, whether influenced by the military-industrial complex or by establishment forces, are very difficult to restore,” he said.
“So from this perspective, China-Russia strategic mutual trust is extremely important for promoting global multipolarity,” he added.
Mr Xi and Mr Putin last met in Beijing in September 2025 when China staged a massive military parade that was also attended by North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un.
Russian Security Council secretary Sergey Shoigu also visited Beijing on Feb 1, during which he met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
The two officials agreed their countries should maintain close ties in a turbulent world, state media reports said.
The two countries had declared a “no limits” strategic partnership days before Mr Putin ordered tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
The US has sought to draw China into any future arms control framework, arguing that Beijing’s growing nuclear capabilities warrant inclusion. But China has consistently rejected the idea, saying that its arsenal remains far smaller than those of the US and Russia and should not be bound by the same limits, a position that Russia has backed.
Analysts said the call could be viewed as a show of alignment between China and Russia on resisting US pressure over disarmament, even as Washington pushes for broader limits on nuclear weapons.
Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov was cited in Interfax on Feb 4 as saying that the Kremlin would handle the issue of the nuclear pact in a measured and responsible manner.
He was also reported to have said that Mr Xi supported the talks in Abu Dhabi and invited Mr Putin to visit China in the first half of 2026, an invitation that Mr Putin accepted.
Professor Cui Hongjian from the Academy of Regional and Global Governance at Beijing Foreign Studies University told The Straits Times the expiry of the New START treaty could lead Washington to intensify pressure on Beijing on future arms control arrangements.
“When both Russia and China jointly feel threats and pressure from a third party, the two sides will certainly need to further coordinate their positions. And when necessary, they can make a unified response,” he said.